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POEMS AND STORIES 

BY 
BEET HAKTE 



SELECTED AND EDITED FOR SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES 
WITH AN INTRODUCTION 

BY 

CHARLES SWAIN THOMAS, A.M. 

Bead of the English Department in the 
Newton {Mass.) High School 




BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO 

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 



CONTENTS 

Preface iii 

Introduction . . . . ' iv 

POEMS 

John Burns of Gettysburg 1 

The Reveille 4 

Relieving Guard 5 

On a Pen of Thomas Starr King 6 

Anniversary Poem - 7 

A Sanitary Message 9 

Chiquita 11 

Plain Language from Truthful James (the Heathen 

Chinee) 13 

The Society upon the Stanislaus 15 

A Greyport Legend 16 

San Francisco 18 

The Mountain Heart' s-Ease 19 

To a Sea-Bird 20 

What the Chimney Sang 21 

Dickens in Camp 22 

The Mission Bells of Monterey 23 

The Angelus 24 

STORIES 

The Luck of Roaring Camp . 26 

The Outcasts of Poker Flat 39 

Tennessee's Partner. 52 

The Iliad of Sandy Bar 64 

How Santa Claus Came to Simpson's Bar 77 

Notes, Comments, and Questions 95 



COPYRIGHT, 1870, B-K FIELDS OSGOOD & CO. 

COPYRIGHT, 1871, 1872 A*n6, 1574, BY JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO. 

COPYRIGHT, 1S9S, i?(^ AND KJOO, BY BRET HARTE 

COPYRIGHT, 1902, BY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN & CO. 

COPYRIGHT, I912, BY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY 

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
CAMBRIDGE . MASSACHUSETTS 



/. /-' 



IF 



ECI.A3204B1 



PREFACE 



While Bret Harte has been famous for nearly half a 
century, comparatively few students of the present genera- 
tion have any conception of the amount or the versatility 
of his writings. His collected works in the Riverside Edi- 
tion comprise nineteen volumes, and embrace sketches, 
essays, short stories, novels, poems, and one drama. In 
order to give students of school and college some adequate 
idea of the extent and variety and method of this work, this 
volume of selections has been prepared. It is hoped that 
the Introduction and the Notes will suggest further reading 
and thus acquaint the student, not only with the author's 
art, but also with the incidents and characters of that roman- 
tic civilization of California which is rapidly passing away 
from the memory of the living. 

For the biographical data of the Introduction the editor is 
largely indebted to Henry C. Mer win's Life of Bret Harte. 

C. S. T. 

Newton, Massachusetts, 
June, 1912. 



INTRODUCTION 

BRET HARTE 

1836-1902 

If we were asked to account for the breadth of sympathy 
which Bret Harte displayed in his life and writing, we 
should undoubtedly be aided in our answer by the know- 
ledge that his paternal grandfather was a Jew, his paternal 
grandmother a member of the Dutch Church, his father a 
Catholic, and his mother an Episcopalian. His wide experi- 
ence in travel, both at home and abroad, his extensive ac- 
quaintance with men of various ranks — from the roughest 
miner of the Far West to the most courtly and the most 
cultivated men of America and of Europe — all this helped 
to deepen and to widen this cosmopolitan attitude. Deeply 
immersed as he was for years in the spirit that the Forty- 
Niners created, Bret Harte never allowed the provincialism 
of his surroundings to deaden the force of this liberal sym- 
pathy. 

Ancestry and Boyhood 

Francis Brett Harte — such was his baptismal name — 
was born in Albany, New York, on August 25, 1836. 
When as a young man he entered upon his career as a jour- 
nalist and short-story writer, he dropped the Francis, clipped 
the final t from Brett, and won renown under the shortened 
name of Bret Harte. And as such he will always be known. 

Bret Harte's father's name was Henry Harte. The father 
was educated at Union College, Schenectady, and became 
an accomplished scholar, especially proficient as a linguist. 



INTRODUCTION V 

He married Elizabeth Kebecca Ostrander, a member of a 
prominent Dutch family. Mr. and Mrs. Harte seem to have 
led a roving and unsettled life. Mr. Harte was, at the time 
of the birth of Francis Brett, a teacher in Albany, where 
he remained three or four years. From Albany the family 
went to Hudson, New York, and later lived — generally for 
short periods — in turn at New Brunswick, New Jersey, at 
Philadelphia, at Providence, Lowell, Boston, and elsewhere. 
Mr. Harte died in 1845. 

At the time of his father's death Francis was nine years 
old, — the youngest of four children — two daughters and 
two sons. They, with their mother, lived for several years 
in New York and Brooklyn, supported by relatives. Later 
all except the elder daughter moved to California. 

Bret Harte attended various schools up to his thirteenth 
year and then his academic life ceased. The atmosphere of 
his father's home, where an unerring literary taste reigned, 
provided his richest experience. At a very early age he ac- 
quired a fondness for Shakespeare and Froissart, and devel- 
oped his liking for the best by further reading in Cervantes, 
Fielding, Smollett, Goldsmith, Dickens, and Irving. 

On the Pacific Slope, 1 854-1 871 

Soon after her arrival in California Mrs. Harte was mar- 
ried to Colonel Andrew Williams, a highly cultivated gentle- 
man, who had been a college friend of her former husband. 
With his mother and stepfather Bret Harte, who was then 
eighteen, lived for over a year, occupying part of his time 
in teaching and part as clerk to an apothecary in San Fran- 
cisco. 

When Bret Harte left Colonel Williams's house in 1856 
he was twenty years old. He first became tutor for a 
family at Alamo. Later he became an express messenger 
on stages which ran between Humboldt Bay and Del Norte, 
in the extreme northern portion of California — an experi- 
ence which finds frequent reflection in his stories — partic- 
ularly in the famous character of Yuba Bill, the California 
stage-driver. After this engagement as expressman, Bret 
Harte became a printer at Union, California, in the office 



Vi INTRODUCTION 

of the Humholdt Times. He also did some teaching, and 
for a short period was again clerk for an apothecary. Just 
before his return to San Francisco in 1856 he was assistant 
editor of the Northern California, a paper published at 
Eureka. 

His editorial career at Eureka had an abrupt close. The 
editor had gone away and had left Bret Harte in charge. 
During the unfortunate absence certain white men near 
Eureka had inflicted a cowardly massacre upon a group of 
Indians. The temporary editor scathingly condemned the 
outrage, and the editorial in turn violently aroused the wrath 
of the American community. A mob, quickly formed, was 
intent on destroying the office and wreaking vengeance on 
the writer. Bret Harte armed himself to meet the issue, 
and on the night of the expected attack, sat at his desk with 
loaded pistols within easy reach. The fortunate arrival of 
government cavalry averted the threatened danger. The 
regular editor on his return to Eureka made peace with his 
clientele by immediately dismissing from his employ the 
writer of the offensive article, and thus left Bret Harte free 
to return to the safer refuge of San Francisco. 

This was in 1857. The fourteen succeeding years, which 
ended with his departure to the East, made Bret Harte the 
most distinguished literary man in California. His writings 
during these years of distinctive authorship, while they an- 
alyzed in trenchant severity the rawness of that mining 
period, nevertheless spread over the entire state a glamour 
which charmingly revealed the primitive and elemental man- 
hood of those mining pioneers. Let us record some of the 
successive tasks which he performed and some of the suc- 
cessful triumphs which his endeavor won. 

When Bret Harte returned to San Francisco in 1857 he 
secured employment as typesetter in the office of a news- 
paper — the Golden Era, edited by an amiable gentleman 
named Laurence. But the young man's interest was not 
long confined to mere typesetting. He yearned to see his 
own productions in print. This pleasure he had had when as 
a lad of eleven he had secretly mailed a poem — Autumnal 
Musings — to the Neio York Sunday Atlas ; and he had 



INTRODUCTION Vil 

rejoiced when he saw this poem published in the succeeding 
issue of that paper. His work on the Northern Califor- 
nia^ though ending in local ignominy, had nevertheless 
sharpened his talents and aroused his ambition. Accord- 
ingly when he found that the moments transferred from 
mechanical to creative composition met with editorial encour- 
agement, he grew more industrious and more efficient. He 
was so successful that he was soon given a desk in the edi- 
torial room, and thus he began in earnest his career as an 
author. The Golden Era^ fortunately, was not merely a 
purveyor of news — its instincts were literary as well. In 
its pages were published many of those sketches later pre- 
served in Bret Harte's collected works — In a Balcony, A 
Boy^s Dog, Sidewalkings,eind the earlier Condensed Novels. 

Feeling now assured of a reliable income, Bret Harte 
married in 1862 Miss Anna Griswold, whose parents lived 
in New York City. To this union four children were born, 
two sons, Griswold and Francis King, and two daughters, 
Jessemy and Ethel. 

Two years after his marriage, Bret Harte was appointed 
secretary of the California Mint. This position he held for 
six years, and as his duties were not arduous he was able all 
the while to continue his literary work. In 1867 he pub- 
lished a volume of poems, the Condensed Novels, and his 
Bohemian Papers. 

In 1868 Anton Koman, a San Francisco bookseller, 
founded the Overland Monthly and asked Bret Harte to 
become the editor. To the initial number Bret Harte con- 
tributed two poems, — San Francisco and The Return of 
Belisarius. The second number was the more significant, 
for it contained The Luck of Boaring Camp, which won 
the attention of James T. Fields, who invited Mr. Harte to 
write for the Atlantic Monthly a story in the same vein. 

Perhaps the production which contributed most to Bret 
Harte's fame was Plain Language from Truthful James, 
more commonly entitled The Heathen Chinee. This poem 
immediately caught the popular ear and was universally 
quoted. The author's attitude toward this effort is proof 
of his critical discernment, for he set little store by it. 



viii INTRODUCTION 

Indeed he at first refused it a place in the Overland, and 
finally published it only when strongly urged by Ambrose 
Bierce and other friends whose literary judgment he val- 
ued. The poem still has currency, due far more to its ac- 
quired momentum than to its inherent literary value, though 
its satire and its cleverness are obvious. 

Among Bret Harte's many friends of this period were 
Thomas Starr King, whose devotion to the North helped to 
save California to the Union ; Mrs. Jessie Benton Fremont, 
wife of John C. Fremont ; Charles N. Stoddard, the author, 
and Mark Twain, who was then a reporter on the Morning 
Call and who was just coming into public notice. 

Bret Harte has written his early impression of Mark 
Twain's powers as a story-teller as revealed in one of the lat- 
ter's earlier visits : — 

" In the course of the conversation he remarked that the 
unearthly laziness that prevailed in the town he had been 
visiting was beyond anything in his previous experience. 
He said the men did nothing all day long but sit around 
the barroom stove, spit, and ' swop lies.' He spoke in a 
low satiric drawl, which was in itself irresistible. He went 
on to tell one of those extravagant stories, and half uncon- 
sciously dropped into the lazy tone and manner of the orig- 
inal narrator. I asked him to tell it again to a friend who 
came in, and then asked him to write it out for the Cali- 
fornian. He did so, and when published it was an emphatic 
success. It was the first work of his that had attracted 
general attention, and it crossed the Sierras for an Eastern 
reading. The story was The Jumping Frog of Caleveras. 
It is now known and laughed over, I suppose, wherever 
the English language is spoken, but it will never be as 
funny to any one in print as it was to me, told for the first 
time by the unknown Twain himself on that morning in the 
San Francisco Mint." 

There are many other incidents in Bret Harte's Califor- 
nia experience on which the biographer would willingly 
pause, for he does not weary of them as Bret Harte himself 
wearied of them. 

Such weariness on Bret Harte's part was obviously not 



INTRODUCTION ix 

due to any lack of prosperity or of friendly appreciation ; for 
his fame was firmly established. He was recognized every- 
where as the skillful literary exponent of California life ; he 
still maintained his profitable secretaryship at the Mint ; he 
was a member of the English faculty at the University of 
California, the Editor of the successful Overland, and the 
centre of a most congenial coterie. But voices urgent and 
alluring were calling him, and in February, 1871, he took 
final leave of a city and a society whose varied phases he had 
so vividly portrayed. The eight intimate friends — all fel- 
low craftsmen — who gave him his farewell dinner later had 
keenly to regret the complete severance of these ties, for 
Mr. Harte was averse to letter-writing and in the future 
months and years there was almost no communication be- 
tween them. In leaving California, however, Bret Harte 
took with him the memory of the gigantic coarseness and 
the elemental virtues of that pioneer life which was to be 
the inspiration for many a future sketch and story. 

On the Atlantic Coast — 1871-1878 

Bret Harte's objective destination was New York, though 
he stopped at Chicago where a group of men had hoped to 
induce him to accept the editorship of the Lakeside Monthly. 
Bret Harte evidently was not much interested in the pro- 
ject, for he carelessly broke his promise to meet the promo- 
ters at the dinner which had been arranged for him. He 
hurried on to New York to the home of his sister, Mrs. F. 
F. Knaufft, where, during the next two years, he and his 
family remained, except for occasional visits elsewhere. 

Soon after his arrival in New York he went with his wife 
and children to Boston, or rather to Cambridge, to be the 
guests for a week at the home of W. D. Howells, at that 
time assistant editor of the Atlantic Monthly. In Cam- 
bridge and in Boston Bret Harte was most cordially re- 
ceived. He met Lowell, Emerson, Longfellow, and many 
other literary men of that group. He seems to have been 
a bit disappointed in Boston ; the transfer from the crude 
and unconventional life of the California redwood forest and 
San Francisco Bohemianism to the refinements of Harvard 



X INTRODUCTION 

College and of Beacon Hill was perhaps too sudden to pre- 
vent a certain vague confusion of culture and hypocrisy. 
The visit, however, was a financial success ; it was at least 
partially responsible for the contract he later made with 
James R. Osgood and Company, then publishers of the At- 
lantic Monthly, by which they agreed to pay Bret Harte 
$10,000 for whatever stories or poems he would write for 
them during the ensuing year. The stories written and 
published under this agreement were : The Poet of Sierra 
Flat, Princess Boh and her Friends, The Romance of the 
Madrono Hollow, and How Santa Claus Came to Simp- 
son^ s Bar. Besides these were the poems: A Greyport 
Legend, A Newport Romance, Concepcion de Arguello, 
Grandmother Tenterden, and The Idyl of Battle Hollow. 

The next seven years of Bret Harte's life — from February, 
1871, when he arrived in New York, to June, 1878, when 
he departed for Crefeld, Prussia, where he was to be United 
States Commercial Agent — were spent largely in New 
York. He lived at various times in Newport; Morristown, 
New Jersey ; New London, Connecticut ; Cohasset, Massa- 
chusetts, and Sea Cliff, Long Island. A portion of his 
time he spent in lecturing, journeying as far west as St. 
Louis. He was chiefly occupied, however, in writing nov- 
els, short stories, sketches, poems, and plays. 

Notwithstanding the high prices he received for much of 
this material, he was temperamentally unfit to manage his 
funds judiciously ; continued financial troubles, therefore, 
came to him and his family. Always harassed by debt and 
habitually restive under the lack of ready money, he was 
glad to accept from President Hayes the Crefeld appointment, 
which his influential friends secured for him. Leaving his 
family at Sea Clifl", he sailed in June, 1878, and never re- 
turned to America. So far as the world knows it was also 
the final parting with his wife, though the cause of the sep- 
aration has, fortunately, never been disclosed. 

Consular Service — 1878-1885 

AVhen Bret Harte first landed in Crefeld, he keenly felt 
the loneliness of his situation. However, he was somewhat 



INTRODUCTION XI 

cheered one day as he was passing a bookstore to catch sight 
of a volume bearing the familiar name of Bret Harte. Ex- 
amination showed it to be a German translation of selected 
stories, and the sight of this helped to dissipate his feeling 
of isolation. 

Bret Harte's official duties as Consul seem to have been 
performed with reasonable satisfaction, but he never ac- 
quired any genuine affection for the place or for the work. 
He was lonely ; his health was not robust ; he was hampered 
by a limited knowledge of the German language ; and he 
finally sought relief from the tedium in a rather extended 
vacation in England. 

His main purpose in going to England was to meet James 
Anthony Froude, the noted historian and essayist. The two 
became fast friends, and Harte remained for some time a 
guest in Froude's home. While in England he brought out 
a volume of stories and poems, and also delivered several 
successful lectures. 

Mr. Merwin, in his life of Bret Harte, names the follow- 
ing as the product of the author's two-years' residence 
in Crefeld : A Legend of Sammstadt, The Indiscretion 
of Elsheth, Views from a German Sjnon, and Unser 
Karl. 

In 1880, Bret Harte, at his request for a transfer, was 
appointed to the consulship at Glasgow, where the salary 
was larger, and where life was more congenial to the author's 
taste. He was, however, frequently drawn down to Lon- 
don, for which city he had acquired a strong predilection. 
Notwithstanding these frequent visits he seems to have sat- 
isfied the Government at Washington that he was doing his 
work satisfactorily, though rumors reached the Department 
that he was too often absent from his post. 

His work as an author went steadily onward, and he was 
likewise able to make some literary friendships. His most 
noted friends were the two novelists, William Black and 
Walter Besant. 

Bret Harte held the consulship at Glasgow until 1885. 
The defeat of the Republican party and the election of 
Grover Cleveland forced his retirement. 



xii INTRODUCTION 

Residence in London — 1885- 1902 

Bret Harte has been criticized for not returning to America. 
Doubtless he might have done so after being relieved of his 
consular post in Glasgow. There may have been family 
reasons ; his second son had married in England and settled 
in a home where the father was a frequent visitor ; perhaps 
he felt that his literary work in England might be more re- 
munerative ; it may be that he was strongly held by the 
glamor of London and the friendships of Londoners. What- 
ever the reason, we may know that it was not because of 
any lack of patriotic devotion to the land of his birth, for 
he was always a strong defender of America and of Ameri- 
can ideals. But to the day of his death he persistently 
kept his residence in England, not even returning to visit 
his relatives or those friends of his who had rejoiced at his 
earlier successes. He seems to have been temperamentally 
averse to going back and picking up the dropped threads of 
the past. 

During the first ten years of his life in London — from 
1885 to 1895 — he made his home with M. Arthur and 
Mme. Van de Velde, friends who had been first attracted 
to him by the admiration they had for his literary work. 
He remained with them until the death of M. Van de Velde, 
and then engaged rooms at 74 Lancaster Gate. Here he 
kept his lodgings until his death in 1902. 

He had many friends in England who freely extended to 
him their hospitality. He sought mild forms of diversion, 
part of the time in traveling on the Continent; but he 
found his highest joy in his work — interested in the com- 
panionship of the new characters he was all the time creat- 
ing, but more fascinated by the company of such old associ- 
ates as Jack Hamlin and Colonel Starbottle. He grew to 
love his art, and to it he was glad to devote his patiently 
unremitting endeavor. 

During the last months of his life Bret Harte was trou- 
bled greatly by cancer of the throat. A surgical operation 
gave only temporary relief. He kept valiantly at his work. 
One day in April, 1902, he seated himself at his desk and 



INTRODUCTION XUl 

wrote the beginning of a new tale of Colonel Starbottle, 
but this he was never to finish. He lingered until May 5, 
when he was suddenly attacked with a severe hemorrhage 
of the throat and died a few hours later. The only persons 
at his bedside were his physicians, Mme. Van de Velde, and 
her servants. His wife and children were in attendance at 
his funeral a few days later. 

Critical Estimate 

The Puritan temperament is not likely to grant full jus- 
tice to Bret Harte's work, for Bret Harte admits to his 
pages themes which a punctilious nature would reject. In 
depicting the wild and brutally immoral life of the western 
mining-camp he painted things as they were ; and his real- 
ism — tinctured always with idealism — required the vivid 
portrayal of the criminal act and the liberal use of the un- 
chastened epithet. Such acts loom so large and such epithets 
roar so loud that the over-scrupulous retreat in quick alarm. 

Should these critics read more deeply they would dis- 
cover that the author had conceived his task to be that of 
the truthful teller of a truthful tale, and that his word 
must therefore be cousin to the deed. He himself is an 
unimpassioned witness ; he stands aloof — not uninterested, 
not unsympathetic — but certainly not a canting moralist 
who is portraying the redness of vice in order to warn evil- 
doers from the mouth of hell-gate. If virtue triumphs, it 
triumphs not because it may point a moral, but because it 
may adorn a tale. You may not like the ethics, but you 
should admit the art. 

Furthermore, you will usually find on close examination 
that the ethics is sound. The charm of the story is often, 
as in The Luck of Roaring Camp, the diffusing essence of 
a barbaric tenderness, which a grim and profane exterior 
cannot encase. It comes out surely, though unostenta- 
tiously. Or it may be, as in Tennessee^ s Partner, an abid- 
ing sense of loyalty — friend to friend — that is all the 
more engaging because it is so manifestly unpretentious, — 
performed as a matter of course without thought of virtuous 
doing and apparently without struggle. Indeed one of the 



Xiv INTRODUCTION 

marked traits in most of the characters that Bret Harte has 
made famous, is what I may call their intuitive act. Colo- 
nel Starbottle, Jack Hamlin, Mr, Oakhurst, Dr. Duchesne 
— each performs unquestioningly in all his varied situations 
the deed which a certain grim fatality seems to exact with 
an unanalyzed but predetermined nicety. Their thoughts 
and acts are weirdly direct. They may be moral, immoral 
or unmoral; but their reaction is immediate. 

Of other characters, however, this is not always so. In 
one of the very best of the later stories — Left Out on Lone 
Star Mountain -^ we see John Ford, the attractive young 
prospector, in a moment of wavering, tempted to appropri- 
ate to himself a mass of virgin gold which is legally his, but 
which rightfully belongs jointly to him and his four part- 
ners. The moral victory is gained, and John Ford hurries 
away to call back his deserting partners to share the new- 
found vein which a sudden slide had disclosed. The moral 
victory is no less great because of the fact that on their re- 
turn they find that a second slide has carried the treasure 
completely away and again left them destitute. 

Chesterton and other critics have pointed out that Bret 
Harte's humor is of the minimizing sort, whereas American 
humor is of the exaggerating sort. Bret Harte tells in The 
Society upon the Stanislaus of the row that interrupted an 
evening's program of their literary society and killed, or at 
least rendered unconscious, one Abner Dean : — 

Then Abner Dean of Angel's raised a point of order, when 
A chunk of old red sandstone took him in the abdomen, 
And he smiled a kind of sickly smile, and curled up on the floor, 
And the subsequent proceedings interested him no more. 

This last line is of course an absurd understatement, but 
it is so markedly understated that the real truth is as obvi- 
ously wrenched as if it were greatly exaggerated. Keally 
the humors are not of two types ; they are variants of the 
same type. Bret Harte generally prefers the quiet smile 
that such minimizing provokes. 

A prevailing element of charm in humor is its unexpect- 
edness — an unlooked-for turn. Colonel Starbottle is very 



INTRODUCTION XV 

much disgusted at the way a certain dispute is carried on 
between two miners. He characterized it as " a fuss that 
gentlemen might have settled in ten minutes over a social 
glass, ef they meant business ; or in ten seconds with a re- 
volver, ef they meant fun." 

These same miners — York and Scott — kept up a long 
dispute. They became rival candidates for the California 
Legislature, and the two former friends and partners engaged 
in a bitter mud-slinging campaign. York delivered his first 
philippic to a crowd in which Scott was an interested list- 
ener. Scott's past was mercilessly exposed. When York 
finished, Scott was pushed to the platform : — 

As his frowsy head and unkempt beard appeared above the 
railing, it was evident that he was drunk. But it was also evi- 
dent, before he opened his lips, that the orator of Sandy Bar 
. . . stood before them. A consciousness jof this power lent 
a certain dignity to his figure. ..." There 's naught, gentle- 
men," said Scott, leaning forward on the railing, — " there 's 
naught as that man hez said as is n't true. I was run outer 
Cairo ; I did belong to the Regulators ; I did desert from the 
army ; I did leave a wife in Kansas. But there 's one thing he 
didn't charge me with, and maybe he 's forgotten. For three 
years, gentlemen, I was that man's partner." 

This element of humor, occurring again and again in the 
speeches of Yuba Bill, Jack Hamlin, Colonel Starbottle, 
Truthful James, and others has been generally recognized as 
an element in Bret Harte distinctly characteristic, but the 
beauty of Bret Harte's language has received scant notice. 
Perhaps this may be explained by the fact that he has had 
few critics, and that his readers have for the most part been 
hasty in their pursuit of story ; they have read principally 
for the pleasure of plot and situation and not for the pleasure 
of style. Yet to one who reads leisurely, the perception 
of this sense of language-beauty is as gratifying as it is 
obvious. Who of our great masters of prose style could 
have written a better description than the one which nar- 
rates the passage of that crude funeral cart which carried the 
body of Tennessee's partner from the gallows to the grave? * 
1 See page 60. 



XVI INTRODUCTION 

More softly melodious though not so trenchantly vivid is 
that paragraph in The Outcasts of Poker Flat which de- 
scribes the death-surroundings of innocent Piney Woods 
and the sin-stained Duchess.^ 

Marked as is the melody of his prose, the quality is even 
more obvious in his verse. His sense of rhythm is so per- 
fect that it does not desert him even when he allows the 
rough miners of the camp to voice their thoughts dramatic- 
ally in the crude dialect of the Forty-Niners. In addition 
to the faultless rhythm, there is a skilled assembling of vo- 
calic and consonantal effects that gives a satisfying sense of 
melody and harmony. This is beautifully wrought out in 
one of the lyrics of Cadet Grey. 

NOT YET 

Not yet, friend, not. yet! the patient stars 
Lean from their lattices, content to wait. 
All is illusion till the morning bars 
Slip from the levels of the Eastern gate. 
Night is too young, friend ! day is too near ; 
Wait for the day that maketh all things clear. 
Not yetf friend, not yet ! 

Not yet, love, not yet ! all is not true, 
All is not ever as it seemeth now. 
Soon shall the river take another blue. 
Soon dies yon light upon the mountain brow. 
What lieth dark, love, bright day will f II ; 
Wait for thy morning, be it good or ill. 
Not yet, love, not yet ! 

Some critics have commented upon Bret Harte's pagan- 
ism, his aloofness from the sense of mystery, and his spirit- 
ual indifference. This censure is not quite deserved, and 
any reader of such of his poems as Relieving Guard or 
The Angelus will see why it is not deserved. He does 
not, to be sure, dwell long on the mystery of human life. 
No one would call him a mystic, or a " subtle asserter of 
the soul," but he has written enough to prove that his soul 

1 See p. 50. 



INTRODUCTION XVii 

did, at times, throb in unison with the highest of high 
themes. That he chose other chords for his more constant 
music does, however, suggest a lack of abundant spiritual 
resource. His habitual realm of art was circumscribed. 

This fact helps us to prophesy concerning the relative 
rank of his poetry and his short stories. Great poetry de- 
mands a more constant lingering upon spiritual themes and a 
more habitual voicing of the haunting of mystery and " high 
seriousness." Stories may or may not breathe the softer 
strains of such indwelling. Certainly they do not demand 
it. We may say, then, that Bret Harte lacks in the habit 
of thought the one great requisite for great poetry. On the 
other hand, he lacks none of the art-demands of the short 
story. The power of immediate entry, keen conception of 
character and situation, skill in staging the action, ability 
to move his characters toward and away, a faultless sense of 
humor and of pathos, a deft selection of the inevitable word 
— all these he has and has in abundant reserve. It is cer- 
tain that as we study his writings we shall eventually come 
to respect the persisting talent revealed in his verse and to 
admire the flashes of genius revealed in his stories. 



POEMS 

JOHN BURNS OF GETTYSBURG 

Have you heard the story that gossips tell 

Of Burns of Gettysburg ? _ No ? Ah, well : 

Brief is the glory that hero earns, 

Briefer the story of poor John Burns. 

He was the fellow who won renown, — 5 

The only man who did n't back down 

When the rebels rode through his native town j 

But held his own in the fight next day, 

When all his townsfolk ran away. 

That was in July sixty-three, 10 

The very day that General Lee, 

Flower of Southern chivalry, 

Baffled and beaten, backward reeled 

From a stubborn Meade and a barren field. 

I might tell how but the day before 16 

John Burns stood at his cottage door, 

Looking down the village street, 

Where, in the shade of his peaceful vine, 

He heard the low of his gathered kine. 

And felt their breath with incense sweet ; 20 

Or I might say, when the sunset burned 

The old farm gable, he thought it turned 

The milk that fell like a babbling flood 

Into the milk-pail red as blood ! 

Or how he fancied the hum of bees 25 

Were bullets buzzing among the trees. 

But all such fanciful thoughts as these 

Were strange to a practical man like Burns, 



2 JOHN BURNS OF GETTYSBUKG 

Who minded only his own concerns, 

Troubled no more by fancies fine 30 

Than one of his calm -eyed, long- tailed kine, — 

Quite old-fashioned and matter-of-fact, 

Slow to argue, but quick to act. 

That was the reason, as some folk say, 

He fought so well on that terrible day. 35 

And it was terrible. On the right 

Kaged for hours the heady fight, 

Thundered the battery's double bass, — 

Difficult music for men to face ; 

While on the left — where now the graves 40 

Undulate like the living waves 

That all that day unceasing swept 

Up to the pits the rebels kept — 

Round shot ploughed the upland glades, 

Sown with bullets, reaped with blades ; 45 

Shattered fences here and there 

Tossed their splinters in the air ; 

The very trees were stripped and bare ; 

The barns that once held yellow grain 

Were heaped with harvests of the slain ; 50 

The cattle bellowed on the plain, 

The turkeys screamed with might and main. 

And brooding barn-fowl left their rest 

With strange shells bursting in each nest. 

Just where the tide of battle turns, 55 

Erect and lonely stood old John Burns. 

How do you think the man was dressed ? 

He wore an ancient long buff vest. 

Yellow as saffron, — but his best ; 

And buttoned over his manly breast 60 

Was a bright blue coat, with a rolling collar, 

And large gilt buttons, — size of a dollar, — 



JOHN BURNS OF GETTYSBURG 3 

With tails that the country-folk called ^' swaller." 

He wore a broad-brimmed, bell-crowned hat, 

White as the locks on which it sat. 65 

Never had such a sight been seen 

For forty years on the village green, 

Since old John Burns was a country beau, 

And went to the " quiltings " long ago. 

Close at his elbows all that day, 70 

Veterans of the Peninsula, 
Sunburnt and bearded, charged away ; 
And striplings, downy of lip and chin, — 
Clerks that the Home Guard mustered in, — 
Glanced, as they passed, at the hat he wore, 75 

Then at the rifle his right hand bore. 
And hailed him, from out their youthful lore, 
With scraps of a slangy repertoire : 
<'How are you. White Hat ? ^' <* Put her through ! '* 
" Your head's level ! " and " Bully for you ! " 80 

Called him *' Daddy," — begged he M disclose 
The name of the tailor who made his clothes, 
And what was the value he set on those ; 
While Burns, unmindful of jeer and scoff, 
Stood there picking the rebels off, — 85 

With his long brown rifle and bell-crown hat, 
And the swallow-tails they were laughing at. 

*T was but a moment, for that respect 

Which clothes all courage their voices checked ; 

And something the wildest could understand 90 

Spake in the old man's strong right hand. 

And his corded throat, and the lurking frown 

Of his eyebrows under his old bell-crown ; 

Until, as they gazed, there crept in awe 

Through the ranks in whispers, and some men saw, 95 

In the antique vestments and long white hair, 



THE REVEILLE 

The Past of the Nation in battle there ; 

And some of the soldiers since declare 

That the gleam of his old white hat afar, 

Like the crested plume of the brave Navarre, 100 

That day was their oriflamme of war. 

So raged the battle. You know the rest : 

How the rebels, beaten and backward pressed, 

Broke at tlie final charge and ran. 

At which John Burns — a practical man — 105 

Shouldered his rifle, unbent his brows, 

And then went back to his bees and cows. 

That is the story of old John Burns ; 

This is the moral the reader learns : 

In fighting the battle, the question ^s whether 110 

You '11 show a hat that 's white, or a feather! 



THE KEVEILLE 

Hark ! I hear the tramp of thousands, 

And of armed men the hum ; 
Lo ! a nation's hosts have gathered 
Kound the quick alarming drum, — 

Saying, *^Come, 5 

Freemen, come ! 
Ere your heritage be wasted," said the quick alarming drum. 

" Let me of my heart take counsel : 
War is not of life the sum ; 
Who shall stay and reap the harvest 10 

When the autumn days shall come ? " 
But the drum 
Echoed, '^Come! 
Death shall reap the braver harvest," said the solemn- 
sounding drum. 



RELIEVING GUARD 6 

"But when won the coming battle, 15 

What of profit springs therefrom ? 
What if conquest, subjugation, 
Even greater ills become ? " 
But the drum 

Answered, ^' Come ! 20 

You must do the sum to prove it,'* said the Yankee-answer- 
ing drum. 

*^ What if, 'mid the cannon's thunder. 
Whistling shot and bursting bomb, 
When my brothers fall around me, 

Should my heart grow cold and numb ? " 25 
But the drum 
Answered, " Come ! 
Better there in death united, than in life a recreant. — 
Come ! " 

Thus they answered, — hoping, fearing, 

Some in faith, and doubting some, 30 

Till a trumpet-voice proclaiming. 
Said, " My chosen people, come ! " 
Then the drum, 
Lo ! was dumb. 
For the great heart of the nation, throbbing, answered, 
'' Lord, we come ! " 



BELIEVING GUARD 

THOMAS STARR KING. OBIIT MARCH 4, 1864 

Came the relief. " What, sentry, ho ! 
How passed the night through thy long waking ? " 
" Cold, cheerless, dark, — as may befit 
The hour before the dawn is breaking." 



ON A PEN OF THOMAS STARR KING 

" No sight ? no sound ? " " No ; nothing save 5 

The plover from the marshy calling, 
And in yon western sky, about 
An hour ago, a star was falling." 

" A star ? There 's nothing strange in that." 
" No, nothing ; but, above the thicket, 10 

Somehow it seemed to me that God 
Somewhere had just relieved a picket." 

ON A PEN OF THOMAS STAER KING 

This is the reed the dead musician dropped, 
With tuneful magic in its sheath still hidden; 

The prompt allegro of its music stopped, 
Its melodies unbidden. 

But who shall finish the unfinished strain, 5 

Or wake the instrument to awe and wonder, 

And bid the slender barrel breathe again, 
An organ-pipe of thunder ! 

His pen ! what humbler memories cling about 

Its golden curves ! what shapes and laughing graces 10 

Slipped from its point, when his full heart went out 
In smiles and courtly phrases ? 

The truth, half jesting, half in earnest flung ; 

The word of cheer, with recognition in it ; 
The note of alms, whose golden speech outrung 15 

The golden gift within it. 

But all in vain the enchanter's wand we wave : 
No stroke of ours recalls his magic vision : 

The incantation that its power gave 

Sleeps with the dead magician. 20 



ANNIVERSARY POEM 7 

ANNIVEESARY POEM 

delivered on the fourteenth anniversary op 
California's admission into the union, Septem- 
ber 9, 1864 

We meet in peace, though from our native East 
The sun that sparkles on our birthday feast 
Glanced as he rose on fields whose dews were red 
With darker tints than those Aurora spread. 
Though shorn his rays, his welcome disk concealed 5 
In the dim smoke that veiled each battlefield, 
Still striving upward, in meridian pride, 
He climbed the walls that East and West divide, — 
Saw his bright face flashed back from golden sand, 
And Sapphire seas that lave the Western land. 10 

Strange was the contrast that such scenes disclose 

From his high vantage o'er eternal snows ; 

There War's alarm the brazen trumpet rings — 

Here his love-song the mailed cicala sings ; 

There bayonets glitter through the forest glades — 15 

Here yellow cornfields stack their peaceful blades ; 

There the deep trench where Valor finds a grave — 

Here the long ditch that curbs the peaceful wave ; 

There the bold sapper with his lighted train — 

Here the dark tunnel and its stores of gain ; 20 

Here the full harvest and the wain's advance — 

There the Grim Keaper and the ambulance. 

With scenes so adverse, what mysterious bond 

Links our fair fortunes to the shores beyond? 

Why come we here — last of a scattered fold — 25 

To pour new metal in the broken mould ? 

To yield our tribute, stamped with Caesar's face, 

To Caesar, stricken in the market-place ? 



ANNIVERSARY POEM 

Ah! love of country is the secret tie 

That joins these contrasts 'neath one arching sky ; 30 

Though brighter paths our peaceful steps explore, 

We meet together at the Nation's door. 

War winds her horn, and giant cliffs go down 

Like the high walls that girt the sacred town, 

And bares the pathway to her throbbing heart, 35 

From clustered village and from crowded mart. 

Part of God's providence it was to found 

A Nation's bulwark on this chosen ground ; 

Not Jesuit's zeal nor pioneer's unrest 

Planted these pickets in the distant West, 40 

But He who first the Nation's fate forecast 

Placed here His fountains sealed for ages past, 

Eock-ribbed and guarded till the coming time 

Should fit the people for their work sublime ; 

When a new Moses with his rod of steel 45 

Smote the tall cliffs with one wide-ringing peal, 

And the old miracle in record told 

To the new Nation was revealed in gold. 

Judge not too idly that our toils are mean. 

Though no new levies marshal on our green ; 50 

Nor deem too rashly that our gains are small, 

Weighed with the prizes for which heroes fall. 

See, where thick vapor wreathes the battle-line ; 

There Mercy follows with her oil and wine; 

Or where brown Labor with its peaceful charm 55 

Stifi'ens the sinews of the Nation's arm. 

What nerves its hands to strike a deadlier blow 

And hurl its legions on the rebel foe ? 

Lo ! for each town new rising o'er our State 

See the foe's hamlet waste and desolate, 60 

While each new factory lifts its chimney tall, 

Like a fresh mortar trained on Richmond's wall. 



A SANITARY MESSAGE 9 

For this, brothers, swings the fruitful vine, 

Spread our broad pastures with their countless kine : 

For this o'erhead the arching vault springs clear, 65 

Sunlit and cloudless for one half the year ; 

For this no snowflake, e'er so lightly pressed, 

Chills the warm impulse of our mother's breast. 

Quick to reply, from meadows brown and sere, 

She thrills responsive to Spring's earliest tear ; 70 

Breaks into blossom, flings her loveliest rose 

Ere the white crocus mounts Atlantic snows ; 

And the example of her liberal creed 

Teaches the lesson that to-day we heed. 

Thus ours the lot with peaceful, generous hand 75 

To spread our bounty o'er the suffering land ; 

As the deep cleft in Mariposa's wall 

Hurls a vast river splintering in its fall, — 

Though the rapt soul who stands in awe below 

Sees but the arching of the promised bow, — 80 

Lo ! the far- streamlet drinks its dews unseen, 

And the whole valley wakes a brighter green. 

A SANITARY MESSAGE 

Last night, above the whistling wind, 

I heard the welcome rain, — 
A fusillade upon the roof, 

A tattoo on the pane : 5 

The keyhole piped ; the chimney-top 

A warlike trumpet blew ; 
Yet, mingling with these sounds of strife, 

A softer voice stole through. 

'' Give thanks, brothers ! " said the voice, 10 

'^That He who sent the rains 
Hath spared your fields the scarlet dew 
That drips from patriot veins : 



10 A SANITARY MESSAGE 

I 've seen the grass on Eastern graves 

In brighter verdure rise ; 
But, oh ! the rain that gave it life 15 

Sprang first from human eyes. 

*' I come to wash away no stain 

Upon your wasted lea ; 
I raise no banners, save the ones 

The forest waves to me : 20 

Upon the mountain side, where Spring 

Her farthest picket sets, 
My reveille awakes a host 

Of grassy bayonets. 

*^I visit every humble roof ; 25 

I mingle with the low ; 
Only upon the highest peaks 

My blessings fall in snow ; 
Until, in tricklings of the stream 

And drainings of the lea, 30 

My unspent bounty comes at last 

To mingle with the sea." 

And thus all night, above the wind, 

I heard the welcome rain, — 
A fusillade upon the roof, 35 

A tattoo on the pane : 
The keyhole piped ; the chimney-top 

A warlike trumpet blew : 
But, mingling with these sounds of strife, 

This hymn of peace stole through. 40 



CHIQUITA 11 

CHIQUITA 

Beautiful ! Sir, you may say so. Thar is n't her match 

in the county ; 
Is thar, old gal, — Chiquita, my darling, my beauty ? 
Feel of that neck, sir, — thar 's velvet! Whoa! steady, — 

ah, will you, you vixen! 
Whoa ! I say. Jack, trot her out ; let the gentleman look 

at her paces. 

Morgan ! — she ain't nothing else, and I 've got the papers 

to prove it. 5 

Sired by Chippewa Chief, and twelve hundred dollars won't 

buy her. 
Briggs of Tuolumne owned her. Did you know Briggs of 

Tuolumne ? 
Busted hisself in White Pine, and blew out his brains down 

in 'Frisco ? 

Hed n't no savey, hed Briggs. Thar, Jack ! that '11 do, — 

quit that foolin' ! 
Nothin' to what she kin do, when she 's got her work cut 

out before her. 10 

Hosses is bosses, you know, and likewise, too, jockeys is 

jockeys : 
And 't ain't ev'ry man as can ride as knows what a boss 

has got in him. 

Know the old ford on the Fork, that nearly got Flanigan's 

leaders ? 
Nasty in daylight, you bet, and a mighty rough ford in low 

water ! 
Well, it ain't six weeks ago that me and the Jedge and his 

nevey 15 



12 CHIQUITA 

Struck for that ford in the night, in the rain, and the water 
all round us ; 

Up to our flanks in the gulch, and Rattlesnake Creek just 

a-bilin', 
Not a plank left in the dam, and nary a bridge on the 

river. 
I had the gray, and the Jedge had his roan, and his nevey, 

Chiquita ; 
And after us trundled the rocks jest loosed from the top of 

the canon. 20 

Lickity, lickity, switch, we came to the ford, and Chiquita 
Buckled right down to her work, and, afore I could yell to 

her rider. 
Took water jest at the ford, and there was the Jedge and 

me standing, 
And twelve hundred dollars of hoss-flesh afloat, and a-drift- 

in' to thunder ! 

Would ye b'lieve it ? That night, that hoss, that 'ar filly, 
Chiquita, 25 

Walked herself into her stall, and stood there, all quiet and 
dripping : 

Clean as a beaver or rat, with nary a buckle of harness. 

Just as she swam the Fork, — that hoss, that 'ar filly, Chi- 
quita. 

That 's what I call a hoss ! and — What did you say ? — 

Oh, the nevey ? 
Drownded, I reckoned, — leastways, he never kem back to 

deny it. 30 

Ye see the derned fool had no seat, ye could n't have made 

him a rider; 
And then, ye know, boys will be beys, and bosses — well, 

bosses is bosses! 



PLAIN LANGUAGE FROM TRUTHFUL JAMES 13 

PLAIN LANGUAGE FROM TRUTHFUL JAMES 

(table mountain, 1870) 

Which I wish to remark, 

And my language is plain, 
That for ways that are dark 

And for tricks that are vain, 
The heathen Chinee is peculiar, 5 

Which the same I would rise to explain. 

Ah Sin was his name ; 

And I shall not deny, 
In regard to the same. 

What that name might imply ; 10 

But his smile it was pensive and childlike, 

As I frequent remarked to Bill Nye. 

It was August the third. 

And quite soft was the skies ; 
Which it might be inferred 15 

That Ah Sin was likewise; 
Yet he played it that day upon William 

And me in a way I despise. 

Which we had a small game. 

And Ah Sin took a hand. 20 

It was Euchre. The same 

He did not understand ; 
But he smiled as he sat by the table. 

With the smile that was childlike and bland. 

Yet the cards they were stocked 25 

In a way that I grieve, 
And my feelings were shocked 



14 PLAIN LANGUAGE FROM TRUTHFUL JAMES 

At the state of Nye's sleeve, 
Which was stuffed full of aces and bowers, 

And the same with intent to deceive. 30 

But the hands that were played 

By that heathen Chinee, 
And the points that he made, 

Were quite frightful to see, -^ 
Till at last he put down a right bower, 35 

Which the same Nye had dealt unto me. 

Then I looked up at Nye, 

And he gazed upon me ; 
And he rose with a sigh. 

And said, "Can this be ? 40 

We are ruined by Chinese cheap labor,'^ — 

And he went for that heathen Chinee. 

In the scene that ensued 

I did not take a hand, 
But the floor it was strewed 45 

Like the leaves on the strand 
With the cards that Ah Sin had been hiding, 

In the game " he did not understand." 

In his sleeves, which were long. 

He had twenty-four jacks, — 50 

Which was coming it strong, 

Yet I state but the facts ; 
And we found on his nails, which were taper. 

What is frequent in tapers, — that's wax. 

Which is why I remark, 55 

And my language is plain. 
That for ways that are dark 

And for tricks that are vain, 
The heathen Chinee is peculiar, — 

Which the same I am free to maintain. 60 



THE SOCIETY UPON THE STANISLAUS 15 



THE SOCIETY UPOK THE STANISLAUS 

I RESIDE at Table Mountain, and my name is Truthful 

James ; 
I am not up to small deceit or any sinful games ; 
And I '11 tell in simple language what I know about the 

row 
That broke up our Society upon the Stanislow. 

But first I would remark, that it is not a proper plan 5 
For any scientific gent to whale his fellow-man, 
And, if a member don't agree with his peculiar whim, 
To lay for that same member for to " put a head" on him. 

Now nothing could be finer or more beautiful to see 
Than the first six months' proceedings of that same Society, 
Till Brown of Calaveras brought a lot of fossil bones 11 
That he found within a tunnel near the tenement of Jones. 

Then Brown he read a paper, and he reconstructed there, 
From those same bones, an animal that was extremely rare ; 
And Jones then asked the Chair for a suspension of the 

rules, 15 

Till he could prove that those same bones was one of his 

lost mules. 

Then Brown he smiled a bitter smile, and said he was at 

fault, 
It seemed he had been trespassing on Jones's family vault ; 
He was a most sarcastic man, this quiet Mr. Brown, 
And on several occasions he had cleaned out the town. 20 

Now I hold it is not decent for a scientific gent 
To say another is an ass, — at least, to all intent ; 
Nor should the individual who happens to be meant 
Reply by heaving rocks at him, to any great extent. 



16 A GREYPORT LEGEND 

Then Abner Dean of Angel's raised a point of order, when 
A chunk of old red sandstone took him in the abdomen, 26 
And he smiled a kind of sickly smile, and curled up on the 

floor, 
And the subsequent proceedings interested him no more. 

For, in less time than I write it, every member did engage 
In a warfare with the remnants of a palaeozoic age ; 30 

And the way they heaved those fossils in their anger was a 

sin. 
Till the skull of an old mammoth caved the head of Thomp- 
son in. 

And this is all I have to say of these improper games, 
For I live at Table Mountain, and my name is Truthful 

James ; 
And I ^ve told in simple language what I know about the row 
That broke up our Society upon the Stanislow. 36 

A GREYPORT LEGEND 

(1797) 

They ran through the streets of the seaport town, 
They peered from the decks of the ships that lay ; 
The cold sea-fog that came whitening down 
Was never as cold or white as they. 

" Ho, Starbuck and Pinckney and Tenterden I 5 

Run for your shallops, gather your men, 
Scatter your boats on the lower bay.^' 

Good cause for fear ! In the thick mid-day 

The hulk that lay by the rotting pier, 

Filled with the children in happy play, 10 

Parted its moorings and drifted clear. 

Drifted clear beyond reach or call, — 
Thirteen children they were in all, — 
All adrift in the lower bay ! 



A GREYPORT LEGEND 17 

Said a hard-faced skipper, " God help us all ! 15 

She will not float till the turning tide ! '' 

Said his wife, " My darling will hear my call, 

Whether in sea or heaven she bide '' ; 

And she lifted a quavering voice and high, 
"Wild and strange as a sea-bird's cry, 20 

Till they shuddered and wondered at her side. 

The fog drove down on each laboring crew, 
Veiled each from each and the sky and shore : 
There was not a sound but the breath they drew, 
And the lap of water and creak of oar ; 25 

And they felt the breath of the downs, fresh blown 
O'er leagues of clover and cold gray stone. 
But not from the lips that had gone before. 

They came no more. But they tell the tale 

That, when fogs are thick on the harbor reef, 30 

The mackerel fishers shorten sail — 

For the signal they know will bring relief ; 

For the voices of children, still at play 

In a phantom hulk that drifts alway 

Through channels whose waters never fail. 35 

It is but a foolish shipman's tale, 

A theme for a poet's idle page ; 

But still, when the mists of Doubt prevail, 

And we lie becalmed by the shores of Age, 

We hear from the misty troubled shore 40 

The voice of the children gone before, 
Drawing the soul to its anchorage. 



18 SAN FRANCISCO 

SAN FEANCISCO 

(from the sea) 

Serene, indifferent of Fate, 
Thou sittest at the Western Gate; 

Upon thj"- height, so lately won, 
Still slant the banners of the sun ; 

Thou seest the white seas strike their tents, 5 

O Warder of two continents ! 

And, scornful of the peace that flies 
Thy angry winds and sullen skies, 

Thou drawest all things, small or great, 

To thee, beside the Western Gate. 10 

lion's whelp, that hidest fast 

In jungle growth of spire and mast ! 

1 know thy cunning and thy greed, 
Thy hard high lust and willful deed, 

And all thy glory loves to tell 16 

Of specious gifts material. 

Drop down, Fleecy Fog, and hide 
Her skeptic sneer and all her pride! 

Wrap her, Fog, in gown and hood 

Of her Franciscan Brotherhood. 20 

Hide me her faults, her sin and blame ; 
With thy gray mantle cloak her shame! 



THE MOUNTAIN HEART'S-EASE 19 

So shall she, cowled, sit and pray 
Till inorniiig bears her sins away. 

Then rise, Fleecy Fog, and raise 25 

The glory of her coming days ; 

Be as the cloud that flecks the seas 
Above her smoky argosies ; 

When forms familiar shall give place 

To stranger speech and newer face ; 30 

When all her throes and anxious fears 
Lie hushed in the repose of years ; 

When Art shall raise and Culture lift 
The sensual joys and meaner thrift, 

And all fulfilled the vision we 35 

Who watch and wait shall never see ; 

Who, in the morning of her race, 
Toiled fair or meanly in our place, 

But, yielding to the common lot, 

Lie unrecorded and forgot. 40 



THE MOUNTAIN HEAKT'S-EASE 

By scattered rocks and turbid waters shifting, 

B}"" furrowed glade and dell, 
To feverish men thy calm, sweet face uplifting, 

Thou stayest them to tell 



20 TO A SEA-BIRD 

The delicate thought that cannot find expression, 5 

For ruder speech too fair, 
That, like thy petals, trembles in possession, 

And scatters on the air. 

The miner pauses in his rugged labor, 

And, leaning on his spade, 10 

Laughingly calls unto his comrade-neighbor 

To see thy charms displayed. 

"But in his eyes a mist unwonted rises, 

And for a moment clear 
Some sweet home face his foolish thought surprises, 15 

And passes in a tear, — 

Some boyish vision of his Eastern village. 

Of uneventful toil. 
Where golden harvests followed quiet tillage 

Above a peaceful soil, 20 

One moment only ; for the pick, uplifting. 

Through root and fibre cleaves, 
And on the muddy current slowly drifting 

Are swept by bruised leaves. 

And yet, poet in thy homely fashion, 25 

Thy work thou dost fulfill, 
For on the turbid current of his passion 

Thy face is shining still. 



TO A SEA-BIRD 

(SANTA CRUZ, 1869) 

Sauntering hither on listless wings, 

Careless vagabond of the sea. 
Little thou heedest the surf that sings, 
The bar that thunders, the shale that rings, 

Give me to keep thy company. 



WHAT THE CHIMNEY SANG 21 

Little thou hast, old friend, that ^s new; 

Storms and wrecks are old things to thee; 
Sick am I of these changes, too ; 
Little to care for, little to rue, — 

I on the shore, and thou on the sea. 10 

All of thy wanderings, far and near, 

Bring thee at last to shore and me ; 
All of my journey ings end them here : 
This our tether must be our cheer, — 

I on the shore, and thou on the sea. 16 

Lazily rocking on ocean's breast, 

Something in common, old friend, have we : 
Thou on the shingle seek'st thy nest, 
I to the waters look for rest, — 

I on the shore, and thou on the sea. 20 



WHAT THE CHIMNEY SANG 

Over the chimney the night-wind sang 

And chanted a melody no one knew ; 
And the Woman stopped, as her babe she tossed, 

And thought of the one she had long since lost, 
And said, as her teardrops back she forced, 5 

" I hate the wind in the chimney." 

Over the chimney the night-wind sang 

And chanted a melody no one knew ; 
And the Children said, as they closer drew, 

" 'T is some witch that is cleaving the black 10 

night through, 
'T is a fairy trumpet that just then blew, 

And we fear the wind in the chimney." 



22 DICKENS IN CAMP 

Over the chimney the night-wind sang 
And chanted a melody no one knew ; 

And the Man, as he sat on his hearth below, 15 

Said to himself, " It will surely snow, 

And fuel is dear and wages low, 

And I '11 stop the leak in the chimney/' 

Over the chimney the night-wind sang 

And chanted a melody no one kn'ew ; 20 

But the Poet listened and smiled, for he 

Was Man and Woman and Child, all three, 
And said, '* It is God's own harmony, 

This wind we hear in the chimney." 



DICKENS m CAMP 

Above the pines the moon was slowly drifting, 

The river sang below ; 
The dim Sierras, far beyond, uplifting 

Their minarets of snow. 

The roaring camp-fire, with rude humor, painted 5 

The ruddy tints of health 
On haggard face and form that drooped and fainted 

In the fierce race for wealth ; 

Till one arose, and from his pack's scant treasure 

A hoarded volume drew, 10 

And cards were dropped from hands of listless leisure 
To hear the tale anew. 

And then, while round them shadows gathered faster, 

And as the firelight fell, 
He read aloud the book wherein the Master 15 

Had writ of ^^ Little Nell." 



THE MISSION BELLS OF MONTEREY 23 

Perhaps 't was boyish fancy, — for the reader 

Was youngest of them all, — 
But, as he read, from clustering pine and cedar 

A silence seemed to fall ; 20 

The fir-trees, gathering closer in the shadows. 

Listened in every spray, 
While the whole camp with '* Nell " on English meadows 

Wandered and lost their way. 

And so in mountain solitudes — o'ertaken 25 

As by some spell divine — 
Their cares dropped from them like the needles shaken 

From out the gusty pine. 

Lost is that camp and wasted all its fire ; 

And he who wrought that spell ? 30 

Ah ! towering pine and stately Kentish spire, 

Ye have one tale to tell ! 

Lost is that camp, but let its fragrant story 

Blend with the breath that thrills 
With hop-vine's incense all the pensive glory 35 

That fills the Kentish hills. 

And on that grave where English oak and holly 

And laurel wreaths entwine. 
Deem it not all a too presumptuous folly, 

This spray of Western pine ! 40 

July, 1870. 

THE MISSION BELLS OF MONTEREY 

O BELLS that rang, bells that sang 
Above the martyrs' wilderness. 
Till from that reddened coast-line sprang 
The Gospel seed to cheer and bless. 



24 THE ANGELUS 

What are your garnered sheaves to-day ? 5 

Mission bells ! Eleison bells ! 
Mission bells of Monterey ! 

bells that crash, bells that clash 

Above the chimney-crowded plain, 

On wall and tower your voices dash, 10 

But never with the old refrain ; 

In mart and temple gone astray ! 

Ye dangle bells ! Ye jangle bells ! 

Ye wrangle bells of Monterey ! 

O bells that die, so far, so nigh, 16 

Come back once more across the sea ; 

Not with the zealot's furious cry, 

Not with the creed's austerity ; 

Come with His love alone to stay, 

O Mission bells ! Eleison bells ! 20 

Mission bells of Monterey ! 



THE ANGELUS 

(heard at the mission DOLORES, 1868) 

Bells of the Past, whose long-forgotten music 
Still fills the wide expanse, 

Tingeing the sober twilight of the Present 
With color of romance ! 

I hear your call, and see the sun descending 
On rock and wave and sand. 

As down the coast the Mission voices, blending. 
Girdle the heathen land. 



THE ANGELUS 25 

Within the circle of your incantation 

No blight nor mildew falls ; 10 

Nor fierce unrest, nor lust, nor low ambition 

Passes those airy walls. 

Borne on the swell of your long waves receding^ 

I touch the farther Past ; 
I see the dying glow of Spanish glory, 15 

The sunset dream and last ! 

Before me rise the dome-shaped Mission towers, 

The white Presidio ; 
The swart commander in his leathern jerkin, 

The priest in stole of snow. 20 

Once more I see Portola's cross uplifting 

Above the setting sun ; 
And past the headland, northward, slowly drifting, 

The freighted galleon. 

O solemn bells ! whose consecrated masses 25 

Kecall the faith of old ; 
tinkling bells ! that lulled with twilight music ! 

The spiritual fold ! 

Your voices break and falter in the darkness, — 

Break, falter, and are still ; 30 

And veiled and mystic, like the Host descending, 
The sun sinks from the hill ! 



STORIES AND SKETCHES 



THE LUCK OF EOAEING CAMP 

There was commotion in Eoaring Camp. It could not 
have been a fight, for in 1850 that was not novel enough to 
have called together the entire settlement. The ditches and 
claims were not only deserted, but '' Tuttle's grocery " had 
contributed its gamblers, who, it will be remembered, 
calmly continued their game the day that French Pete and 
Kanaka Joe shot each other to death over the bar in the 
front room. The whole camp was collected before a rude 
cabin on the outer edge of the clearing. Conversation was 
carried on in a low tone, but the name of a woman was 
frequently repeated. It was a name familiar enough in 
the camp, — " Cherokee Sal." 

Perhaps the less said of her the better. She was a 
coarse and, it is to be feared, a very sinful woman. But at 
that time she was the only woman in Eoaring Camp, and 
was just then lying in sore extremity, when she most 
needed the ministration of her own sex. Dissolute, aban- 
doned, and irreclaimable, she was yet suffering a martyrdom 
hard enough to bear even when veiled by sympathizing 
womanhood, but now terrible in her loneliness. The primal 
curse had come to her in that original isolation which must 
have made the punishment of the first transgression so 
dreadful. It was, perhaps, part of the expiation of her sin 



THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 27 

that, at a moment when she most lacked her sex's intuitive 
tenderness and care, she met only the half -contemptuous 
faces of her masculine associates. Yet a few of the specta- 
tors were, I think, touched by her sufferings. Sandy Tipton 
thought it was " rough on Sal," and, in the contemplation 
of her condition, for a moment rose superior to the fact that 
he had an ace and two bowers in his sleeve. 

It will be seen also that the situation was novel. 
Deaths were by no means uncommon in Roaring Camp, but 
a birth was a new thing. People had been dismissed the 
camp effectively, finally, and with no possibility of return ; 
but this was the first time that anybody had been introduced 
ab initio. Hence the excitement. 

"You go in there. Stumpy," said a prominent citizen 
known as " Kentuck," addressing one of the loungers. 
" Go in there, and see what you kin do. You 've had 
experience in them things." 

Perhaps there was a fitness in the selection. Stumpy, in 
other climes, had been the putative head of two families ; 
in fact, it was owing to some legal informality in these 
proceedings that Roaring Camp — a city of refuge — was 
indebted to his company. The crowd approved the choice, 
and Stumpy was wise enough to bow to the majority. The 
door closed on the extempore surgeon and midwife, and 
Roaring Camp sat down outside, smoked its pipe, and 
awaited the issue. 

The assemblage numbered about a hundred men. One 
or two of these were actual fugitives from justice, some 
were criminal, and all were reckless. Physically they 
exhibited no indication of their past lives and character. 
The greatest scamp had a Raphael face, with a profusion of 
blonde hair ; Oakhurst, a gambler, had the melancholy air 
and intellectual abstraction of a Hamlet ; the coolest and 
most courageous man was scarcely over five feet in height, 
with a soft voice and an embarrassed, timid manner. The 



28 THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 

term " roughs " applied to them was a distinction rather 
than a definition. Perhaps in the minor details of fingers, 
toes, ears, etc., the camp may have been deficient, but these 
slight omissions did not detract from their aggregate force. 
The strongest man had but three fingers on his right hand ; 
the best shot had but one eye. 

Such was the physical aspect of the men that were dis- 
persed around the cabin. The camp lay in a triangular 
valley between two hills and a river. The only outlet was 
a steep trail over the summit of a hill that faced the cabin, 
now illuminated by the rising moon. The sufiering woman 
might have seen it from the rude bunk whereon she lay, — 
seen it winding like a silver thread until it was lost in the 
stars above. 

A fire of withered pine boughs added sociability to the 
gathering. By degrees the natural levity of Koaring Camp 
returned. Bets were freely offered and taken regarding the 
result. Three to five that '' Sal would get through with 
it ; " even that the child would survive ; side bets as to the 
sex and complexion of the coming stranger. In the midst 
of an excited discussion an exclamation came from those 
nearest the door, and the camp stopped to listen. Above 
the swaying and moaning of the pines, the swift rush of the 
river, and the crackling of the fire rose a sharp, querulous 
cry, — a cry unlike anything heard before in the camp. 
The pines stopped moaning, the river ceased to rush, and 
the fire to crackle. It seemed as if Kature had stopped to 
listen too. 

The camp rose to its feet as one man ! It was proposed 
to explode a barrel of gunpowder; but in consideration of 
the situation of the mother, better counsels prevailed, and 
only a few revolvers were discharged ; for whether owing 
to the rude surgery of the camp, or some other reason, 
Cherokee Sal was sinking fast. Within an hour she had 
climbed, as it were, that rugged road that led to the stars. 



THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 29 

and so passed out of Roaring Camp, its sin and shame, for- 
ever. I do not think that the announcement disturbed them 
much, except in speculation as to the fate of the child. 
" Can he live now ? '^ was asked of Stumpy. The answer 
was doubtful. The only other being of Cherokee Sal's sex 
and maternal condition in the settlement was an ass. 
There was some conjecture as to fitness, but the experiment 
was tried. It was less problematical than the ancient treat- 
ment of Komulus and Remus, and apparently as success- 
ful. 

When these details were completed, which exhausted 
another hour, the door was opened, and the anxious crowd 
of men, who had already formed themselves into a queue, 
entered in single file. Beside the low bunk or shelf, on 
which the figure of the mother was starkly outlined below 
the blankets, stood a pine table. On this a candle-box was 
placed, and within it, swathed in staring red flannel, lay the 
last arrival at Roaring Camp. Beside the candle-box was 
placed a hat. Its use was soon indicated. " Gentlemen," 
said Stumpy, with a singular mixture of authority and ex 
officio complacency, — " gentlemen will please pass in at 
the front door, round the table, and out at the back door. 
Them as wishes to contribute anything toward the orphan 
will find a hat handy." The first man entered with his hat 
on ; he uncovered, however, as he looked about him, and 
so unconsciously set an example to the next. In such 
communities good and bad actions are catching. As the 
procession filed in comments were audible, — criticisms ad- 
dressed perhaps rather to Stumpy in the character of show- 
man : "Is that him ? " " Mighty small specimen ; " 
" Has n't more 'n got the color ; " " Ain't bigger nor a der- 
ringer." The contributions were as characteristic : A 
silver tobacco box ; a doubloon ; a navy revolver, silver 
mounted ; a gold specimen ; a very beautifully embroidered 
lady's handkerchief (from Oakhurst the gambler) ; a dia- 



30 THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 

mond breastpin ; a diamond ring (suggested by the pin, with 
the remark from the giver that he ** saw that pin and went 
two diamonds better ") ; a slung-shot ; a Bible (contributor 
not detected) ; a golden spur ; a silver teaspoon (the initials, 
I regret to say, were not the giver's) ; a pair of surgeon's 
shears ; a lancet ; a Bank of England note for £5; and about 
$200 in loose gold and silver coin. During these proceed- 
ings Stumpy maintained a silence as impassive as the dead on 
his left, a gravity as inscrutable as that of the newly born 
on his right. Only one incident occurred to break the monot- 
ony of the curious procession. As Kentuck bent over the 
candle-box half curiously, the child turned, and, in a spasm 
of pain, caught at his groping finger, and held it fast for a 
moment. Kentuck looked foolish and embarrassed. Some- 
thing like a blush tried to assert itself in his weather-beaten 
cheek. ^' The d — d little cuss ! " he said, as he extricated 
his finger, with perhaps more tenderness and care than he 
might have been deemed capable of showing. He held 
that finger a little apart from its fellows as he went out, 
and examined it curiously. The examination provoked the 
same original remark in regard to the child. In fact, he 
seemed to enjoy repeating it. ^^ He rastled with my finger,** 
he remarked to Tipton, holding up the member, '' the d — d 
little cuss ! " 

It was four o'clock before the camp sought repose. A 
light burnt in the cabin where the watchers sat, for Stumpy 
did not go to bed that night. Nor did Kentuck. He drank 
quite freely, and related with great gusto his experience, 
invariably ending with his characteristic condemnation of 
the newcomer. It seemed to relieve him of any unjust 
implication of sentiment, and Kentuck had the weaknesses 
of the nobler sex. When everybody else had gone to bed, 
he walked down to the river and whistled reflectingly. 
Then he walked up the gulch past the cabin, still whistling 
with demonstrative unconcern. At a large redwood-tree he 



THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 31 

paused and retraced his steps, and again passed the cabin. 
Halfway down to the river^s bank he again paused, and 
then returned and knocked at the door. It was opened by 
Stumpy. " How goes it ? '^ said Kentuck, looking past 
Stumpy toward the candle-box. " All serene ! " replied 
Stumpy. "Anything up?" "Nothing." There was a 
pause — an embarrassing one — Stumpy still holding the 
door. Then Kentuck had recourse to his finger, which he 
held up to Stumpy. " Kastled with it, — the d — d little 
cuss," he said, and retired. 

The next day Cherokee Sal had such rude sepulture as 
Roaring Camp afforded. After her body had been committed 
to the hillside, there was a formal meeting of the camp to 
discuss what should be done with her infant. A resolution 
to adopt it was unanimous and enthusiastic. But an ani- 
mated discussion in regard to the manner and feasibility of 
providing for its wants at once sprang up. It was remarkable 
that the argument partook of none of those fierce person- 
alities with which discussions were usually conducted at 
Roaring Camp. Tipton proposed that they should send the 
child to Red Dog, — a distance of forty miles, — where 
female attention could be procured. But the unlucky sug- 
gestion met with fierce and unanimous opposition. It was 
evident that no plan which entailed parting from their new 
acquisition would for a moment be entertained. " Besides," 
said Tom Ryder, " them fellows at Red Dog would swap 
it, and ring in somebody else on us." A disbelief in the 
honesty of other camps prevailed at Roaring Camp, as in 
other places. 

The introduction of a female nurse in the camp also met 
with objection. It was argued that no decent woman could 
be prevailed to accept Roaring Camp as her home, and the 
speaker urged that " they did n't want any more of the other 
kind." This unkind allusion to the defunct mother, harsh 
as it may seem, was the first spasm of propriety, — the first 



32 THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 

symptom of the camp's regeneration. Stumpy advanoed 
nothing. Perhaps he felt a certain delicacy in interfering 
with the selection of a possible successor in office. But 
when questioned, he averred stoutly that he and " Jinny" — 
the mammal before alluded to — could manage to rear the 
child. There was something original, independent, and 
heroic about the plan that pleased the camp. Stumpy was 
retained. Certain articles were sent for to Sacramento. 
" Mind," said the treasurer, as he pressed a bag of gold-dust 
into the expressman's hand, " the best that can be got, — 
lace, you know, and filigree-work and frills, — d — n the 
cost ! " 

Strange to say, the child thrived. Perhaps the invigo- 
rating climate of the mountain camp was compensation for 
material deficiencies. Nature took the foundling to her 
broader breast. In that rare atmosphere of the Sierra foot- 
hills, — that air pungent with balsamic odor, that ethereal 
cordial at once bracing and exhilarating, — he may have 
found food and nourishment, or a subtle chemistry that 
transmuted ass's milk to lime and phosphorus. Stumpy 
inclined to the belief that it was the latter and good nurs- 
ing. " Me and that ass," he would say, " has been father 
and mother to him ! Don't you," he would add, apostro- 
phizing the helpless bundle before him, "never go back 
on us." 

By the time he was a month old the necessity of giving 
him a name became apparent. He had generally been 
known as " The Kid," " Stumpy's Boy," " The Coyote " 
(an allusion to his vocal powers), and even by Kentuck's 
endearing diminutive of ^' The d — d little cuss." But these 
were felt to be vague and unsatisfactory, and were at last 
dismissed under another influence. Gamblers and adven- 
turers are generally superstitious, and Oakhurst one day 
declared that the baby had brought " the luck " to RoaTing 
Camp. It was certain that of late they had been success- 



THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 33 

ful. ** Luck " was the name agreed upon, with the prefix 
of Tommy for greater convenience. No allusion was made 
to the mother, and the father was unknown. " It's better," 
said the philosophical Oakhurst, " to take a fresh deal all 
round. Call him Luck, and start him fair." A day was 
accordingly set apart for the christening. What was meant 
by this ceremony the reader may imagine who has already 
gathered some idea of the reckless irreverence of Roaring 
Camp. The master of ceremonies was one " Boston," a 
noted wag, and the occasion seemed to promise the greatest 
facetiousness. This ingenious satirist had spent two days 
in preparing a burlesque of the Church service, with pointed 
local allusions. The choir was properly trained, and Sandy 
Tipton was to stand godfather. But after the procession 
had marched to the grove with music and banners, and the 
child had been deposited before a mock altar. Stumpy 
stepped before the expectant crowd. *' It ain't my style to 
spoil fun, boys," said the little man, stoutly eying the faces 
around him, " but it strikes me that this thing ain't exactly 
on the squar. It 's playing it pretty low down on this yer 
baby to ring in fun on him that he ain't goin' to understand. 
And ef there 's goin' to be any godfathers round, I 'd like to 
see who 's got any better rights than me." A silence fol- 
lowed Stumpy' s speech. To the credit of all humorists be 
it said that the first man to acknowledge its justice was the 
satirist thus stopped of his fun. " But," said Stumpy, 
quickly following up his advantage, " we 're here for a 
christening, and we '11 have it. I proclaim you Thomas 
Luck, according to the laws of the United States and the 
State of California, so help me God." It was the first time 
that the name of the Deity had been otherwise uttered than 
profanely in the camp. The form of christening was per- 
haps even more ludicrous than the satirist had conceived ; 
but strangely enough, nobody saw it and nobody laughed. 
** Tommy " was christened as seriously as he would have 



34 THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 

been under a Christian roof, and cried and was comforted m 
as orthodox fashion. 

And so the work of regeneration began in Roaring 
Camp. Almost imperceptibly a change came over the 
settlement. The cabin assigned to " Tommy Luck " — or 
**The Luck,'' as he was more frequently called — first 
showed signs of improvement. It was kept scrupulously 
clean and whitewashed. Then it was boarded, clothed, 
and papered. The rosewood cradle, packed eighty miles by 
mule, had, in Stumpy's way of putting it, " sorter killed 
the rest of the furniture." So the rehabilitation of the 
cabin became a necessity. The men who were in the habit 
of lounging in at Stumpy's to see " how ' The Luck ' got on " 
seemed to appreciate the change, and in self-defense the 
rival establishment of " Tuttle's grocery " bestirred itself 
and imported a carpet and mirrors. The reflections of the 
latter on the appearance of Roaring Camp tended to pro- 
duce stricter habits of personal cleanliness. Again Stumpy 
imposed a kind of quarantine upon those who aspired to the 
honor and privilege of holding The Luck. It was a cruel 
mortification to Kentuck — who, in the carelessness of a 
large nature and the habits of frontier life, had begun to 
regard all garments as a second cuticle, which, like a 
snake's, only sloughed off through decay — to be debarred 
this privilege from certain prudential reasons. Yet such 
was the subtle influence of innovation that he thereafter 
appeared regularly every afternoon in a clean shirt and 
face still shining from his ablutions. Nor were moral and 
social sanitary laws neglected. " Tommy," who was sup- 
posed to spend his whole existence in a persistent attempt 
to repose, must not be disturbed by noise. The shouting 
and yelling, which had gained the camp its infelicitous title, 
were not permitted within hearing distance of Stumpy's. 
The men conversed in whispers or smoked with Indian 
gravity. Profanity was tacitly given up in these sacred pre- 



THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 35 

cincts, and throughout the camp a popular form of exple- 
tive, known as '^ D — n the luck ! " and " Curse the luck ! " 
was abandoned, as having a new personal bearing. Vocal 
music was not interdicted, being supposed to have a sooth- 
ing, tranquilizing quality ; and one song, sung by ^' Man-o'- 
War Jack," an English sailor from her Majesty's Australian 
colonies, was quite popular as a lullaby. It was a lugubri- 
ous recital of the exploits of '' the Arethusa, Seventy -four,'' 
in a muffled minor, ending with a prolonged dying fall at 
the burden of each verse, '' On b-oo-o-ard of the Arethusa." 
It was a fine sight to see Jack holding The Luck, rocking 
from side to side as if with the motion of a ship, and croon- 
ing forth this naval ditty. Either through the peculiar 
rocking of Jack or the length of his song, — it contained 
ninety stanzas, and was continued with conscientious deliber- 
ation to the bitter end, — the lullaby generally had the 
desired effect. At such times the men would lie at full 
length under the trees in the soft summer twilight, smok- 
ing their pipes and drinking in the melodious utterances. 
An indistinct idea that this was pastoral happiness per- 
vaded the camp. *' This 'ere kind o' think," said the 
Cockney Simmons, meditatively reclining on his elbow, " is 
'evingly." It reminded him of Greenwich. 

On the long summer days The Luck was usually carried 
to the gulch from whence the golden store of Koaring 
Camp was taken. There, on a blanket spread over pine 
boughs, he would lie while the men were working in the 
ditches below. Latterly there was a rude attempt to deco- 
rate this bower with flowers and sweet-smelling shrubs, and 
generally some one would bring him a cluster of wild honey- 
suckles, azaleas, or the painted blossoms of Las Mariposas. 
The men had suddenly awakened to the fact that there 
were beauty and significance in these trifles, which they had 
so long trodden carelessly beneath their feet. A flake of 
glittering mica, a fragment of variegated quartz, a bright 



36 THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 

pebble from the bed of the creek, became beautiful to eye8 
thus cleared and strengthened, and were invariably put 
aside for The Luck. It was wonderful how many trea- 
sures the woods and hillsides yielded that " would do for 
Tommy." Surrounded by playthings such as never child 
out of fairyland had before, it is to be hoped that Tommy 
was content. He appeared to be serenely happy, albeit 
there was an infantine gravity about him, a contemplative 
light in his round gray eyes, that sometimes worried Stumpy. 
He was always tractable and quiet, and it is recorded that 
once, having crept beyond his " corral," — a hedge of tessel- 
lated pine boughs, which surrounded his bed, — he dropped 
over the bank on his head in the soft earth, and remained 
•with his mottled legs in the air in that position for at least 
five minutes with unflinching gravity. He was extricated 
without a murmur. I hesitate to record the many other 
instances of his sagacity, which rest, unfortunately, upon 
the statements of prejudiced friends. Some of them were 
not without a tinge of superstition. ^' I crep' up the bank 
just now," said Kentuck one day, in a breathless state of 
excitement, " and dern my skin if he was n't a-talking to a 
jaybird as was a-sittin' on his lap. There they was, just as 
free and sociable as anything you please, a-jawin' at each 
other just like two cherry bums." Howbeit, whether creep- 
ing over the pine boughs or lying lazily on his back blink- 
ing at the leaves above him, to him the birds sang, the 
squirrels chattered, and the flowers bloomed. Nature was 
his nurse and playfellow. For him she would let slip be- 
tween the leaves golden shafts of sunlight that fell just 
within his grasp ; she would send wandering breezes to 
visit him with the balm of bay and resinous gum ; to him 
the tall redwoods nodded familiarly and sleepily, the bum- 
blebees buzzed, and the rooks cawed a slumbrous accom- 
paniment. 

Such was the golden summer of Eoaring Camp. Th«y 



THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 37 

were " flush times,'' and the luck was with them. The 
claims had yielded enormously. The camp was jealous of 
its privileges and looked suspiciously on strangers. No 
encouragement was given to immigration, and, to make 
their seclusion more perfect, the land on either side of 
the mountain wall that surrounded the camp they duly 
preempted. This, and a reputation for singular proficiency 
with the revolver, kept the reserve of Koaring Camp invio- 
late. The expressman — their only connecting link with 
the surrounding world — sometimes told wonderful stories 
of the camp. He would say, ^' They 've a street up there 
in ^ Roaring ' that would lay over any street in Red Dog. 
They 've got vines and flowers round their houses, and they 
wash themselves twice a day. But they 're mighty rough 
on strangers, and they worship an Ingin baby." 

With the prosperity of the camp came a desire for 
further improvement. It was proposed to build a hotel in 
the following spring, and to invite one or two decent fam- 
ilies to reside there for the sake of The Luck, who might 
perhaps profit by female companionship. The sacrifice that 
this concession to the sex cost these men, who were fiercely 
skeptical in regard to its general virtue and usefulness, can 
only be accounted for by their afi'ection for Tommy. A few 
still held out. But the resolve could not be carried into 
effect for three months, and the minority meekly yielded in 
the hope that something might turn up to prevent it. And 
it did. 

The winter of 1851 will long be remembered in the foot- 
hills. The snow lay deep on the Sierras, and every moun- 
tain creek became a river, and every river a lake. Each 
gorge and gulch was transformed into a tumultuous water- 
course that descended the hillsides, tearing down giant trees 
and scattering its drift and debris along the plain. Red 
Dog had been twice under water, and Roaring Camp had 
been forewarned. " Water put the gold into them gulches," 



38 THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 

said Stumpy. " It 's been here once and will be here again ! " 
And that night the North Fork suddenly leaped over its 
banks and swept up the triangular valley of Roaring Camp. 

In the confusion of rushing water, crashing trees, and 
crackling timber, and the darkness which seemed to flow 
with the water and blot out the fair valley, but little could 
be done to collect the scattered camp. When the morning 
broke, the cabin of Stumpy, nearest the river-bank, was 
gone. Higher up the gulch they found the body of its un- 
lucky owner ; but the pride, the hope, the joy. The Luck, 
of Roaring Camp had disappeared. They were returning 
with sad hearts when a shout from the bank recalled them. 

It was a relief-boat from down the river. They had 
picked up, they said, a man and an infant, nearly exhausted, 
about two miles below. Did anybody know them, and 
did they belong here ? 

It needed but a glance to show them Kentuck lying 
there, cruelly crushed and bruised, but still holding The 
Luck of Roaring Camp in his arms. As they bent over the 
strangely assorted pair, they saw that the child was cold 
and pulseless. " He is dead," said one. Kentuck opened 
his eyes. " Dead ? " he repeated feebly. " Yes, my man, 
and you are dying too." A smile lit the eyes of the expir- 
ing Kentuck " Dying ! " he repeated ; '' he 's a-taking 
me with him. Tell the boys I 've got The Luck with me 
now ; " and the strong man, clinging to the frail babe as a 
drowning man is said to cling to a straw, drifted away into 
the shadowy river that flows forever to the unknown sea. 



THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 

As Mr. John Oakhurst, gambler, stepped into the main 
street of Poker Flat on the morning of the 23d of Novem- 
ber, 1850, he was conscious of a change in its moral atmos- 
phere since the preceding night. Two or three men, con- 
versing earnestly together, ceased as he approached, and 
exchanged significant glances. There was a Sabbath lull 
in the air, which, in a settlement unused to Sabbath in- 
fluences, looked ominous. 

Mr. Oakhurst's calm, handsome face betrayed small con- 
cern in these indications. Whether he was conscious of 
any predisposing cause was another question. " I reckon 
they 're after somebody," he reflected ; " likely it 's me." 
He returned to his pocket the handkerchief with whieh he 
had been whipping away the red dust of Poker Flat from 
his neat boots, and quietly discharged his mind of any 
further conjecture. 

In point of fact. Poker Flat was " after somebody." It 
had lately suff'ered the loss of several thousand dollars, two 
valuable horses, and a prominent citizen. It was experi- 
encing a spasm of virtuous reaction, quite as lawless and 
ungovernable as any of the acts that had provoked it. A 
secret committee had determined to rid the town of all im- 
proper persons. This was done permanently in regard of 
two men who were then hanging from the boughs of a 
sycamore in the gulch, and temporarily in the banishment 
of certain other objectionable characters. I regret to say 
that some of these were ladies. It is but due to the sex, 
however, to state that their impropriety was professional, 



40 THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 

and it was only in such easily established standards of evil 
that Poker Flat ventured to sit in judgment. 

Mr. Oakhurst was right in supposing that he was in- 
cluded in this category. A few of the committed had 
urged hanging him as a possible example and a sure 
method of reimbursing themselves from his pockets of the 
sums he had won from them. *^ It 's agin justice/' said 
Jim Wheeler, ^^ to let this yer young man from Roaring 
Camp — an entire stranger — carry away our money." But 
a crude sentiment of equity residing in the breasts of those 
who had been fortunate enough to win from Mr. Oakhurst 
overruled this narrower local prejudice. 

Mr. Oakhurst received his sentence with philosophic 
calmness, none the less coolly that he was aware of the 
hesitation of his judges. He was too much of a gambler 
not to accept fate. With him life was at best an uncertain 
game, and he recognized the usual percentage in favor of 
the dealer. 

A body of armed men accompanied the deported wicked- 
ness of Poker Flat to the outskirts of the settlement. 
Besides Mr. Oakhurst, who was known to be a coolly deS' 
perate man, and for whose intimidation the armed escort 
was intended, the expatriated party consisted of a young 
woman familiarly known as " The Duchess ; '^ another who 
had won the title of *' Mother Shipton ; " and ^' Uncle 
Billy," a suspected sluice-robber and confirmed drunkard. 
The cavalcade provoked no comments from the spectators, 
nor was any word uttered by the escort. Only when the 
gulch which marked the uttermost limit of Poker Flat was 
reached, the leader spoke briefly and to the point. The 
exiles were forbidden to return at the peril of their lives. 

As the escort disappeared, their pent-up feelings found 
vent in a few hysterical tears from the Duchess, some bad 
language from Mother Shipton, and a Parthian volley of 
expletives from Uncle Bil)y. The philosophic Oakhurst 



THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 41 

alone remained silent. He listened calmly to Mother 
Shipton's desire to cut somebody's heart out, to the 
repeated statements of the Duchess that she would die in 
the road, and to the alarming oaths that seemed to be 
bumped out of Uncle Billy as he rode forward. With the 
easy good humor characteristic of his class, he insisted 
upon exchanging his own riding-horse, ^' Five-Spot," for 
the sorry mule which the Duchess rode. But even this 
act did not draw the party into any closer sympathy. The 
young woman readjusted her somewhat draggled plumes 
with a feeble, faded coquetry ; Mother Shipton eyed the 
possessor of ''Five-Spot" with malevolence, and Uncle 
Billy included the whole party in one sweeping anathema. 

The road to Sandy Bar — a camp that, not having as yet 
experienced the regenerating influences of Poker Flat, con- 
sequently seemed to offer some invitation to the emigrants 
— lay over a steep mountain range. It was distant a day's 
severe travel. In that advanced season the party soon 
passed out of the moist, temperate regions of the foothills 
into the dry, cold, bracing air of the Sierras. The trail 
was narrow and difficult. At noon the Duchess, rolling 
out of her saddle upon the ground, declared her intention 
of going no farther, and the party halted. 

The spot was singularly wild and impressive. A wooded 
amphitheatre, surrounded on three sides by precipitous 
cliffs of naked granite, sloped gently toward the crest of 
another precipice that overlooked the valley. It was, un- 
doubtedly, the most suitable spot for a camp, had camping 
been advisable. But Mr. Oakhurst knew that scarcely half 
the journey to Sandy Bar was accomplished, and the party 
were not equipped or provisioned for delay. This fact he 
pointed out to his companions curtly, with a philosophic 
commentary on the folly of '^ throwing up their hand before 
the game was played out." But they were furnished with 
liquor, which in this emergency stood them in place of food. 



42 THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 

fuel, rest, and prescience. In spite of his remonstrances, it 
was not long before they were more or less under its influ- 
ence. Uncle Billy passed rapidly from a bellicose state into 
one of stupor, the Duchess became maudlin, and Mother 
Shipton snored. Mr. Oakhurst alone remained erect, lean- 
ing against a rock, calmly surveying them. 

Mr. Oakhurst did not drink. It interfered with a pro- 
fession which required coolness, impassiveness, and presence 
of mind, and, in his own language, he '' could n't afford it.'' 
As he gazed at his recumbent fellow exiles, the loneliness 
begotten of his pariah trade, his habits of life, his very vices, 
for the first time seriously oppressed him. He bestirred 
himself in dusting his black clothes, washing his hands and 
face, and other acts characteristic of his studiously neat 
habits, and for a moment forgot his annoyance. The 
thought of deserting his weaker and more pitiable compan- 
ions never perhaps occurred to him. Yet he could not help 
feeling the want of that excitement which, singularly 
enough, was most conducive to that calm equanimity for 
which he was notorious. He looked at the gloomy walls 
that rose a thousand feet sheer above the circling pines 
around him, at the sky ominously clouded, at the valley 
below, already deepening into shadow ; and, doing so, sud- 
denly he heard his own name called. 

A horseman slowly ascended the trail. In the fresh, 
open face of the newcomer Mr. Oakhurst recognized Tom 
Simson, otherwise known as " The Innocent," of Sandy 
Bar. He had met him some months before over a " little 
game," and had, with perfect equanimity, won the entire 
fortune — amounting to some forty dollars — of that guile- 
less youth. After the game was finished, Mr. Oakhurst 
drew the youthful speculator behind the door and thus ad- 
dressed him : '^ Tommy, you 're a good little man, but you 
can't gamble worth a cent. Don't try it over again." He 



THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 43 

then handed him his money back, pushed him gently from 
the room, and so made a devoted slave of Tom Simson. 

There was a remembrance of this in his boyish and en- 
thusiastic greeting of Mr. Oakhurst. He had started, he 
said, to go to Poker Flat to seek his fortune. ^' Alone ? " 
No^ not exactly alone ; in fact (a giggle), he had run away 
with Piney Woods. Did n't Mr. Oakhurst remember Piney ? 
She that used to wait on the table at the Temperance 
House ? They had been engaged a long time, but old 
Jake Woods had objected, and so they had run away, and 
were going to Poker Flat to be married, and here they 
were. And they were tired out, and how lucky it was they 
had found a place to camp, and company. All this the 
Innocent delivered rapidly, while Piney, a stout, comely 
damsel of fifteen, emerged from behind the pine-tree, 
where she had been blushing unseen, and rode to the side 
of her lover. 

Mr. Oakhurst seldom troubled himself with sentiment, 
still less with propriety ; but he had a vague idea that the 
situation was not fortunate. He retained, however, his 
presence of mind sufficiently to kick Uncle Billy, who was 
about to say something, and Uncle Billy was sober enough 
to recognize in Mr. Oakhurst's kick a superior power that 
would not bear trifling. He then endeavored to dissuade 
Tom Simson from delaying further, but in vain. He even 
pointed out the fact that there was no provision, nor means 
of making a camp. But, unluckily, the Innocent met this 
objection by assuring the party that he was provided with 
an extra mule loaded with provisions, and by the discovery 
of a rude attempt at a log house near the trail. '' Piney 
can stay with Mrs. Oakhurst," said the Innocent, pointing 
to the Duchess, "and I can shift for myself." 

Nothing but Mr. Oakhurst's admonishing foot saved 
Uncle Billy from bursting into a roar of laughter. As it 



44 THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 

was, he felt compelled to retire up the canon until he could 
recover his gravity. There he confided the joke to the tall 
pine-trees, with many slaps of his leg, contortions of his 
face, and the usual profanity. But when he returned to 
the party, he found them seated by a fire — for the air had 
grown strangely chill and the sky overcast — in apparently 
amicable conversation. Piney was actually talking in an 
impulsive girlish fashion to the Duchess, who was listening 
with an interest and animation she had not shown for 
many days. The Innocent was holding forth, apparently 
with equal effect, to Mr. Oakhurst and Mother Shipton, 
who was actually relaxing into amiability. '' Is this yer a 
d — d picnic ? " said Uncle Billy, with inward scorn, as he 
surveyed the sylvan group, the glancing firelight, and the 
tethered animals in the foreground. Suddenly an idea 
mingled with the alcoholic fumes that disturbed his brain. 
It was apparently of a jocular nature, for he felt impelled 
to slap his leg again and cram his fist into his mouth. 

As the shadows crept slowly up the mountain, a slight 
breeze rocked the tops of the pine-trees and moaned 
through their long and gloomy aisles. The ruined cabin, 
patched and covered with pine boughs, was set apart for the 
ladies. As the lovers parted, they unaffectedly exchanged 
a kiss, so honest and sincere that it might have been heard 
above the swaying pines. The frail Duchess and the 
malevolent Mother Shipton were probably too stunned to 
remark upon this last evidence of simplicity, and so turned 
without a word to the hut. The fire was replenished, the 
men lay down before the door, and in a few minutes were 
asleep. 

Mr. Oakhurst was a light sleeper. Toward morning he 
awoke benumbed and cold. As he stirred the dying fire, 
the wind, which was now blowing strongly, brought to his 
cheek that which caused the blood to leave it, — snow ! 

He started to his feet with the intention of awakening 



THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 45 

the sleepers, for there was no time to lose. But turning to 
where Uncle Billy had been lying, he found him gone. A 
suspicion leaped to his brain, and a curse to his lips. He 
ran to the spot where the mules had been tethered — they 
were no longer there. The tracks were already rapidly dis- 
appearing in the snow. 

The momentary excitement brought Mr. Oakhurst back 
to the fire with his usual calm. He did not waken the 
sleepers. The Innocent slumbered peacefully, with a smile 
on his good-humored, freckled face ; the virgin Piney 
slept beside her frailer sisters as sweetly as though attended 
by celestial guardians ; and Mr. Oakhurst, drawing his 
blanket over his shoulders, stroked his mustaches and 
waited for the dawn. It came slowly in a whirling mist 
of snowflakes that dazzled and confused the eye. What 
could be seen of the landscape appeared magically changed. 
He looked over the valley, and summed up the present 
and future in two words, ^^ Snowed in ! '' 

A careful inventory of the provisions, which, fortunately 
for the party, had been stored within the hut, and so 
escaped the felonious fingers of Uncle Billy, disclosed the 
fact that with care and prudence they might last ten days 
longer. ^'That is," said Mr. Oakhurst sotto voce to the 
Innocent, " if you 're willing to board us. If you ain't — 
and perhaps you 'd better not — you can wait till Uncle 
Billy gets back with provisions." For some occult reason, 
Mr. Oakhurst could not bring himself to disclose Uncle 
Billy's rascality, and so offered the hypothesis that he had 
wandered from the camp and had accidentally stampeded the 
animal-s. He dropped a warning to the Duchess and 
Mother Shipton, who of course knew the facts of their 
associate's defection. " They '11 find out the truth about us 
all when they find out anything," he added significantly, 
" and there 's no good frightening them now." 

Tom Simson not only put all his worldly store at the 



46 THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 

disposal of Mr. Oakhurst, but seemed to enjoy the prospect 
of their enforced seclusion. " We '11 have a good camp for 
a week, and then the snow '11 melt, and we '11 all go back 
together." The cheerful gayety of the young man and 
Mr. Oakhurst' s calm infected the others. The Innocent, 
with the aid of pine boughs, extemporized a thatch for the 
roofless cabin, and the Duchess directed Piney in the 
rearrangement of the interior with a taste and tact that 
opened the blue eyes of that provincial maiden to their 
fullest extent. '* I reckon now you 're used to fine things at 
Poker Flat," said Piney. The Duchess turned away sharply 
to conceal something that reddened her cheeks through 
their professional tint, and Mother Shipton requested Piney 
not to " chatter." But when Mr. Oakhurst returned from 
a weary search for the trail, he heard the sound of happy 
laughter echoed from the rocks. He stopped in some 
alarm, and his thoughts first naturally reverted to the 
whiskey, which he had prudently cached. " And yet it 
don't somehow sound like whiskey," said the gambler. It 
was not until he caught sight of the blazing fire through 
the still blinding storm, and the group around it, that he 
settled to the conviction that it was " square fun." 

Whether Mr. Oakhurst had cached his cards with the 
whiskey as something debarred the free access of the com- 
munity, I cannot say. It was certain that, in Mother 
Shipton's words, he " did n't say ' cards ' once " during that 
evening. Haply the time was beguiled by an accordion, 
produced somewhat ostentatiously by Tom Simson from 
his pack. Notwithstanding some difficulties attending the 
manipulation of this instrument, Piney Woods managed to 
pluck several reluctant melodies from its keys, to an accom- 
paniment by the Innocent on a pair of bone castanets. 
But the crowning festivity of the evening was reached in a 
rude camp-meeting hymn, which the lovers, joining hands, 
sang with great earnestness and vociferation. I fear that a 



THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 47 

certain defiant tone and Covenanter's swing to its chorus, 

rather than any devotional quality, caused it speedily to 

infect the others, who at last joined in the refrain : — 

"I 'm proud to live in the service of the Lord, 
And I 'm bound to die in His army." 

The pines rocked, the storm eddied and whirled above the 
miserable group, and the flames of their altar leaped heaven- 
ward, as if in token of the vow. 

At midnight the storm abated, the rolling clouds parted, 
and the stars glittered keenly above the sleeping camp. 
Mr. Oakhurst, whose professional habits had enabled him 
to live on the smallest possible amount of sleep, in dividing 
the watch with Tom Simson somehow managed to take 
upon himself the greater part of that duty. He excused 
himself to the Innocent by saying that he had " often been 
a week without sleep.'' " Doing what ? " asked Tom. 
" Poker ! '^ replied Oakhurst sententiously. ^' When a man 
gets a streak of luck, — nigger-luck, — he don't get tired. 
The luck gives in first. Luck," continued the gambler 
reflectively, " is a mighty queer thing. All you know 
about it for certain is that it 's bound to change. And it 's 
finding out when it's going to change that makes you. 
We 've had a streak of bad luck since we left Poker Flat, — 
you come along, and slap you get into it, too. If you can 
hold your cards right along you 're all right. For," added 
the gambler, with cheerful irrelevance — 

** * I 'm proud to live in the service of the Lord, 
And I 'm bound to die in His army.' " 

The third day came, and the sun, looking through the 
white-curtained valley, saw the outcasts divide their slowly 
decreasing store of provisions for the morning meal. It 
was one of the peculiarities of that mountain climate that 
its rays difi'used a kindly warmth over the wintry landscape, 
as if in regretful commiseration of the past. But it revealed 
drift on drift of snow piled high around the hut, — a hope- 



48 THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 

less, uncharted, trackless sea of white lying below the rocky 
shores to which the castaways still clung. Through the 
marvelously clear air the smoke of the pastoral village of 
Poker Flat rose miles away. Mother Sliiptou saw it, and 
from a remote pinnacle of her rocky fastness hurled in that 
direction a final malediction. It was her last vituperative 
attempt, and perhaps for that reason was invested with a 
certain degree of sublimity. It did her good, she privately 
informed the Duchess. " Just you go out there and cuss, 
and see." She then set herself to the task of amusing ^' the 
child," as she and the Duchess were pleased to call Piney. 
Piney was no chicken, but it was a soothing and original 
theory of the pair thus to account for the fact that she 
did n't swear and was n't improper. 

When night crept up again through the gorges, the reedy 
notes of the accordion rose and fell in fitful spasms and 
long-drawn gasps by the flickering campfire. But music 
failed to fill entirely the aching void left by insufficient 
food, and a new diversion was proposed by Piney, — story- 
telling. Neither Mr. Oakhurst nor his female companions 
caring to relate their personal experiences, this plan would 
have failed too, but for the Innocent. Some months before 
he had chanced upon a stray copy of Mr. Pope's ingenious 
translation of the Iliad. He now proposed to narrate the 
principal incidents of that poem — having thoroughly mas- 
tered the argument and fairly forgotten the words — in the 
current vernacular of Sandy Bar. And so for the rest of 
that night the Homeric demigods again walked the earth. 
Trojan bully and wily Greek wrestled in the winds, and the 
great pines in the caiion seemed to b6w to the wrath of the 
son of Peleus. Mr. Oakhurst listened with quiet satisfaction. 
Most especially was he interested in the fate of ^' Ash-heels," 
as the Innocent persisted in denominating the ''swift-footed 
Achilles." 

So, with small food and much of Homer and the accor- 



THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 49 

dion, a week passed over the heads of the outcasts. Th« 
sun again forsook them, and again from leaden skies the 
snowflakes were sifted over the land. Day by day closet 
around them drew the snowy circle, until at last they looked 
from their prison over drifted walls of dazzling white, that 
towered twenty feet above their heads. It became more 
and more difficult to replenish their fires, even from the 
fallen trees beside them, now half hidden in the drifts. 
And yet no one complained. The lovers turned from the 
dreary prospect and looked into each other's eyes, and were 
happy. Mr. Oakhurst settled himself coolly to the losing 
game before him. The Duchess, more cheerful than she 
had been, assumed the care of Piney. Only Mother Ship- 
ton — once the strongest of the party — seemed to sicken 
and fade. At midnight on the tenth day she called Oak- 
hurst to her side. " I 'm going," she said, in a voice of 
querulous weakness, '' but don't say anything about it. 
Don't waken the kids. Take the bundle from under my 
head, and open it." Mr. Oakhurst did so. It contained 
Mother Shipton's rations for the last week, untouched. 
" Give 'em to the child," she said, pointing to the sleeping 
Piney. *' You 've starved yourself," said the gambler. 
" That 's what they call it," said the woman querulously, as 
she lay down again, and, turning her face to the wall, passed 
quietly away. 

The accordion and the bones were put aside that day, 
and Homer was forgotten. When the body of Mother 
Shipton had been committed to the snow, Mr. Oakhurst 
took the Innocent aside, and showed him a pair of snow- 
shoes, which he had fashioned from the old pack-saddle. 
" There 's one chance in a hundred to save her yet," he said, 
pointing to Piney ; " but it 's there," he added, pointing 
toward Poker Flat. " If you can reach there in two days 
she 's safe." '^ And you ? " asked Tom Simson. ^' I '11 stay 
here," was the curt reply. 



50 THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 

The lovers parted with a long embrace. " You are not 
going, too ? '* said the Duchess, as she saw Mr. Oakhurst 
apparently waiting to accompany him. " As far as the 
canon," he replied. He turned suddenly and kissed the 
Duchess, leaving her pallid face aflame, and her trembling 
limbs rigid with amazement. 

Night came, but not Mr. Oakhurst. It brought the storm 
again and the whirling snow. Then the Duchess, feeding 
the fire, found that some one had quietly piled beside the 
hut enough fuel to last a few days longer. The tears rose 
to her eyes, but she hid them from Piney. 

The women slept but little. In the morning, looking 
into each other's faces, they read their fate. Neither spoke, 
but Piney, accepting the position of the stronger, drew near 
and placed her arm around the Duchess's waist. They 
kept this attitude for the rest of the day. That night the 
storm reached its greatest fury, and, rending asunder the 
protecting vines, invaded the very hut. 

Toward morning they found themselves unable to feed 
the fire, which gradually died away. As the embers 
slowly blackened, the Duchess crept closer to Piney, and 
broke the silence of many hours : *' Piney, can you pray ? " 
"No, dear," said Piney simply. The Duchess, without 
knowing exactly why, felt relieved, and, putting her head 
upon Piney's shoulder, spoke no more. And so reclining, 
the younger and purer pillowing the head of her soiled sis- 
ter upon her virgin breast, they fell asleep. 

The wind lulled as if it feared to waken them. Feath- 
ery drifts of snow, shaken from the long pine boughs, flew 
like white winged birds, and settled about them as they 
slept. The moon through the rifted clouds looked down 
upon what had been the camp. But all human stain, all 
trace of earthly travail, was hidden beneath the spotless 
mantle mercifully flung from above. 

They slept all that day and the next, nor did they wakeD 



THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 51 

when voices and footsteps broke the silence of the camp. 
And when pitying fingers brushed the snow from their 
wan faces, you could scarcely have told from the equal 
peace that dwelt upon them which was she that had sinned. 
Even the law of Poker Flat recognized this, and turned 
away, leaving them still locked in each other's arms. 

But at the head of the gulch, on one of the largest pine- 
trees, they found the deuce of clubs pinned to the bark 
with a bowie-knife. It bore the following, written in pen- 
cil in a firm hand : — 

t 

BENEATH THIS TREE 

LIES THE BODY 

OF 

JOHN OAKHURST, 

WHO STRUCK A STREAK OF BAD LUCK 

ON THE 23d of NOVEMBER 1850, 

AND 

HANDED IN HIS CHECKS 

ON THE 7th DECEMBER, 1850. 



And pulseless and cold, with a Derringer by his side and a 
bullet in his heart, though still calm as in life, beneath the 
snow lay he who was at once the strongest and yet the 
weakest of the outcasts of Poker Flat. 



TENNESSEE'S PAETNER 

I DO not think that we ever knew his real name. Our 
ignorance of it certainly never gave us any social inconven- 
ience, for at Sandy Bar in 1854 most men were christened 
anew. Sometimes these appellatives were derived from 
some distinctiveness of dress, as in the case of " Dungaree 
Jack " ; or from some peculiarity of habit, as shown in 
" Saleratus Bill," so called from an undue proportion of 
that chemical in his daily bread ; or from some unlucky 
slip, as exhibited in '' The Iron Pirate," a mild, inoffensive 
man, who earned that baleful title by his unfortunate mis- 
pronunciation of the term ''iron pyrites." Perhaps this 
may have been the beginning of a rude heraldry ; but I am 
constrained to think that it was because a man's real name 
in that day rested solely upon his own unsupported state- 
ment. " Call yourself Clifford, do you ? " said Boston, 
addressing a timid newcomer with infinite scorn ; " hell is 
full of such Cliffords ! " He then introduced the unfor- 
tunate man, whose name happened to be really Clifford, as 
*' Jaybird Charley," — an unhallowed inspiration of the 
moment that clung to him ever after. 

But to return to Tennessee's Partner, whom we never 
knew by any other than this relative title. That he had 
ever existed as a separate and distinct individuality we only 
learned later. It seems that in 1853 he left Poker Flat to 
go to San Francisco, ostensibly to procure a wife. He 
never got any farther than Stockton. At that place he was 
attracted by a young person who waited upon the table at 
the hotel where he took his meals. One morning he said 



TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 53 

something to her which caused her to smile not unkindly, 
to somewhat coquettishly break a plate of toast over his 
upturned, serious, simple face, and to retreat to the kitchen. 
He followed her, and emerged a few moments later, covered 
with more toast and victory. That day week they were mar- 
ried by a justice of the peace, and returned to Poker Flat. 
I am aware that something more might be made of this epi- 
sode, but I prefer to tell it as it was current at Sandy Bar, 
— in the gulches and bar-rooms, — where all sentiment was 
modified by a strong sense of humor. 

Of their married felicity but little is known, perhaps for 
the reason that Tennessee, then living with his partner, one 
day took occasion to say something to the bride on his own 
account, at which, it is said, she smiled not unkindly and 
chastely retreated, — this time as far as Marysville, where 
Tennessee followed her, and where they went to house- 
keeping without the aid of a justice of the peace. Ten- 
nessee's Partner took the loss of his wife simply and seri- 
ously, as was his fashion. But to everybody's surprise, 
when Tennessee one day returned from Marysville, without 
his partner's wife, — she having smiled and retreated with 
somebody else, — Tennessee's Partner was the first man 
to shake his hand and greet him with affection. The 
boys who had gathered in the canon to see the shooting 
were naturally indignant. Their indignation might have 
found vent in sarcasm but for a certain look in Tennessee's 
Partner's eye that indicated a lack of humorous appreciation. 
In fact, he was a grave man, with a steady application to 
practical detail which was unpleasant in a difficulty. 

Meanwhile a popular feeling against Tennessee had 
grown up on the Bar. He was known to be a gambler ; 
he was suspected to be a thief. In these suspicions Ten- 
nessee's Partner was equally compromised ; his continued 
intimacy with Tennessee after the affair above quoted could 
only be accounted for on the hypothesis of a copartnership 



54 TENNESSEE S PARTNER 

of crime. At last Tennessee's guilt became flagrant. One 
day he overtook a stranger on his way to Ked Dog. The 
stranger afterward related that Tennessee beguiled the time 
with interesting anecdote and reminiscence, but illogically 
concluded the interview in the following words : " And 
now, young man, I '11 trouble you for your knife, your 
pistols, and your money. You see your weppings might 
get you into trouble at Ked Dog, and your money ^s a 
temptation to the evilly disposed. I think you said your 
address was San Francisco. I shall endeavor to call.'^ It 
may be stated here that Tennessee had a fine flow of 
humor, which no business preoccupation could wholly sub- 
due. 

This exploit was his last. Red Dog and Sandy Bar 
made common cause against the highwayman. Tennessee 
was hunted in very much the same fashion as his prototype, 
the grizzly. As the toils closed around him, he made a 
desperate dash through the Bar, emptying his revolver at 
the crowd before the Arcade Saloon, and so on up Grizzly 
Caiion ; but at its farther extremity he was stopped by a 
small man on a gray horse. The men looked at each other 
a moment in silence. Both were fearless, both self-pos- 
sessed and independent, and both types of a civilization 
that in the seventeenth century would have been called 
heroic, but in the nineteenth simply " reckless." 

" What have you got there ? — I call," said Tennessee 
quietly. 

" Two bowers and an ace," said the stranger as quietly, 
showing two revolvers and a bowie-knife. 

" That takes me," returned Tennessee ; and, with this 
gambler's epigram, he threw away his useless pistol and 
rode back with his captor. 

It was a warm night. The cool breeze which usually 
sprang up with the going down of the sun behind the 
chaparral-crested mountain was that evening withheld from 



TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 55 

Sandy Bar. The little canon was stifling with heated 
resinous odors, and the decaying driftwood on the Bar sent 
forth faint sickening exhalations. The feverishness of day 
and its fierce passions still filled the camp. Lights moved 
restlessly along the bank of the river, striking no answering 
reflection from its tawny current. Against the blackness 
of the pines the windows of the old loft above the express- 
office stood out staringly bright ; and through their curtain- 
less panes the loungers below could see the forms of those 
who were even then deciding the fate of Tennessee. And 
above all this, etched on the dark firmament, rose the 
Sierra, remote and passionless, crowned with remoter pas- 
sionless stars. 

The trial of Tennessee was conducted as fairly as was 
consistent with a judge and jury who felt themselves to 
some extent obliged to justify, in their verdict, the previous 
irregularities of arrest and indictment. The law of Sandy 
Bar was implacable, but not vengeful. The excitement and 
personal feeling of the chase were over; with Tennessee 
safe in their hands, they were ready to listen patiently to 
any defense, which they were already satisfied was insuffi- 
cient. There being no doubt in their own minds, they 
were willing to give the prisoner the benefit of any that 
might exist. Secure in the hypothesis that he ought to be 
hanged on general principles, they indulged him with more 
latitude of defense than his reckless hardihood seemed to 
ask. The Judge appeared to be more anxious than the 
prisoner, who, otherwise unconcerned, evidently took a grim 
pleasure in the responsibility he had created. ^' I don't 
take any hand in this yer game," had been his invariable 
but good-humored reply to all questions. The Judge — 
who was also his captor — for a moment vaguely regretted 
that he had not shot him " on sight " that morning, but 
presently dismissed this human weakness as unworthy of 
the judicial mind. Nevertheless, when there was a tap at 



56 TENNESSEE S PARTNER 

the door, and it was said that Tennessee's Partner was there 
on behalf of the prisoner, he was admitted at once without 
question. Perhaps the younger members of the jury, to 
whom the proceedings were becoming irksomely thoughtful, 
hailed him as a relief. 

For he was not, certainly, an imposing figure. Short and 
stout, .with a square face, sunburned into a preternatural 
redness, clad in a loose duck '^jumper" and trousers 
streaked and splashed with red soil, his aspect under any 
circumstances would have been quaint, and was now even 
ridiculous. As he stooped to deposit at his feet a heavy 
carpetbag he was carrying, it became obvious, from partially 
developed legends and inscriptions, that the material with 
which his trousers had been patched had been originally in- 
tended for a less ambitious covering. Yet he advanced with 
great gravity, and after shaking the hand of each person in 
the room with labored cordiality, he wiped his serious per- 
plexed face on a red bandana handkerchief, a shade lighter 
than his complexion, laid his pow^erful hand upon the table 
to steady himself, and thus addressed the Judge : — 

" I was passin' by," he began, by way of apology, " and 
I thought I'd just step in and see how things was gittin' 
on with Tennessee thar, — my pardner. It 's a hot night. 
I disremember any sich weather before on the Bar." 

He paused a moment, but nobody volunteering any other 
meteorological recollection, he again had recourse to his 
pocket-handkerchief, and for some moments mopped his 
face diligently. 

^' Have you anything to say on behalf of the prisoner ? '' 
said the Judge finally. 

" Thet 's it," said Tennessee's Partner, in a tone of relief. 
" I come yar as Tennessee's pardner, — knowing him nigh 
on four year, off and on, wet and dry, in luck and out o* 
luck. His ways ain't aller my ways, but thar ain't any 
p'ints in that young man, thar ain't any liveliness as he 's 



TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 57 

been up to, as I don't know. And you sez to me, sez you, 
— confidential-like, and between man and man, — sez you, 

* Do you know anything in his behalf ? ' and I sez to you, 
sez I, — confidential - like, as between man and man, — 

* What should a man know of his pardner ? ' '' 

" Is this all you have to say ? " asked the Judge impa- 
tiently, feeling, perhaps, that a dangerous sympathy of 
humor was beginning to humanize the court. 

'^Thet's so," continued Tennessee's Partner. ^' It ain't 
for me to say anything agin' him. And now, what 's the 
case ? Here 's Tennessee wants money, wants it bad, and 
does n't like to ask it of his old pardner. Well, what does 
Tennessee do ? He lays for a stranger, and he fetches that 
stranger ; and you lays for Aim, and you fetches him ; and 
the honors is easy. And I put it to you, bein' a fa'r-minded 
man, and to you, gentlemen all, as fa'r-minded men, ef this 
is n't so." 

"Prisoner," said the Judge, interrupting, "have you any 
questions to ask this man ? " 

" No ! no ! " continued Tennessee's Partner hastily. " I 
play this yer hand alone. To come down to the bed-rock, 
it 's just this : Tennessee, thar, has played it pretty rough 
and expensive-like on a stranger, and on this yer camp. 
And now, what 's the fair thing ? Some would say more, 
some would say less. Here 's seventeen hundred dollars in 
coarse gold and a watch, — it 's about all my pile, — and 
call it square ! " And before a hand could be raised to 
prevent him, he had emptied the contents of the carpetbag 
upon the table. 

For a moment his life was in jeopardy. One or two 
men sprang to their feet, several hands groped for hidden 
weapons, and a suggestion to " throw him from the win- 
dow " was only overridden by a gesture from the Judge. 
Tennessee laughed. And apparently oblivious of the ex- 
citement, Tennessee's Partner improved the opportunity to 
mop his face again with his handkerchief. 



58 TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 

When order was restored, and the man was made to 
understand, by the use of forcible figures and rhetoric, that 
Tennessee's ofi'ense could not be condoned by money, his 
face took a more serious and sanguinary hue, and those 
who were nearest to him noticed that his rough hand 
trembled slightly on the table. He hesitated a moment as 
he slowly returned the gold to the carpetbag, as if he had 
not yet entirely caught the elevated sense of justice which 
swayed the tribunal, and was perplexed with the belief that 
he had not offered enough. Then he turned to the Judge, 
and saying, " This yer is a lone hand, played alone, and 
without my pardner," he bowed to the jury and was about 
to withdraw, when the Judge called him back : — 

" If you have anything to say to Tennessee, you had 
better say it now." 

For the first time that evening the eyes of the prisoner 
and his strange advocate met. Tennessee smiled, showed 
his white teeth, and saying, " Euchred, old man ! " held 
out his hand. Tennessee's Partner took it in his own, and 
saying, " I just dropped in as I was passin' to see how 
things was gettin' on," let the hand passively fall, and add- 
ing that " it was a warm night," again mopped his face 
with his handkerchief, and without another word withdrew. 

The two men never again met each other alive. For the 
unparalleled insult of a bribe ofi*ered to Judge Lynch — 
who, whether bigoted, weak, or narrow, was at least incor- 
ruptible — firmly fixed in the mind of that mythical per- 
sonage any wavering determination of Tennessee's fate ; 
and at the break of day he was marched, closely guarded, 
to meet it at the top of Marley's Hill. 

How he met it, how cool he was, how he refused to say 
anything, how perfect were the arrangements of the com- 
mittee, were all duly reported, with the addition of a warn- 
ing moral and example to all future evil-doers, in the ^' Ked 
Dog Clarion," by its editor, who was present, and to whose 
vigorous English I cheerfully refer the reader. But the 



TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 59 

beauty of that midsummer morning, the blessed amity of 
earth and air and sky, the awakened life of the free woods 
and hills, the joyous renewal and promise of Nature, and 
above all, the infinite serenity that thrilled through each, 
was not reported, as not being a part of the social lesson. 
And yet, when the weak and foolish deed was done, and a 
life, with its possibilities and responsibilities, had passed 
out of the misshapen thing that dangled between earth and 
sky, the birds sang, the flowers bloomed, the sun shone, as 
cheerily as before ; and possibly the " Red Dog Clarion " 
was right. 

Tennessee's Partner was not in the group that surrounded 
the ominous tree. But as they turned to disperse, atten- 
tion was drawn to the singular appearance of a motionless 
donkey-cart halted at the side of the road. As they ap- 
proached, they at once recognized the venerable " Jenny '* 
and the two-wheeled cart as the property of Tennessee's 
Partner, used by him in carrying dirt from his claim ; and 
a few paces distant the owner of the equipage himself, 
sitting under a buckeye-tree, wiping the perspiration from 
his glowing face. In answer to an inquiry, he said he had 
come for the body of the " diseased," '^ if it was all the 
same to the committee." He did n't wish to " hurry any- 
thing " ; he could *' wait." He was not working that day ; 
and when the gentlemen were done with the " diseased," 
he would take him. " Ef thar is any present," he added, 
in his simple, serious way, " as would care to jine in the 
fun'l, they kin come." Perhaps it was from a sense of 
humor, which I have already intimated was a feature of 
Sandy Bar, — perhaps it was from something even better 
than that, but two thirds of the loungers accepted the in- 
vitation at once. 

It was noon when the body of Tennessee was delivered 
into the hands of his partner. As the cart drew up to the 
fatal tree, we noticed that it contained a rough oblong box, 



60 TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 

— apparently made from a section of sluicing, — and half 
filled with bark and the tassels of pine. The cart was 
further decorated with slips of willow and made fragrant 
with buckeye-blossoms. When the body was deposited in 
the box, Tennessee's Partner drew over it a piece of tarred 
canvas, and gravely mounting the narrow seat in front, with 
his feet upon the shafts, urged the little donkey forward. 
The equipage moved slowly on, at that decorous pace which 
was habitual with Jenny even under less solemn circum- 
stances. The men — half curiously, half jestingly, but 
all good-humoredly — strolled along beside the cart, some 
in advance, some a little in the rear of the homely cata- 
falque. But whether from the narrowing of the road or 
some present sense of decorum, as the cart passed on, the 
company fell to the rear in couples, keeping step, and 
otherwise assuming the external show of a formal proces- 
sion. Jack Folinsbee, who had at the outset played a fu- 
neral march in dumb show upon an imaginary trombone, 
desisted from a lack of sympathy and appreciation, — not 
having, perhaps, your true humorist's capacity to be con- 
tent with the enjoyment of his own fun. 

The way led through Grizzly Canon, by this time 
clothed in funereal drapery and shadows. The redwoods, 
burying their moccasined feet in the red soil, stood in 
Indian file along the track, trailing an uncouth benediction 
from their bending boughs upon the passing bier. A hare, 
surprised into helpless inactivity, sat upright and pulsating 
in the ferns by the roadside as the cortege Avent by. 
Squirrels hastened to gain a secure outlook from higher 
boughs ; and the blue-jays, spreading their wings, fluttered 
before them like outriders, until the outskirts of Sandy Bar 
were reached, and the solitary cabin of Tennessee's Partner. 

Viewed under more favorable circumstances, it would 
not have been a cheerful place. The unpicturesque site, 
the rude and unlovely outlines, the unsavory details, which 



TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 61 

distinguish the nest-huilding of the California miner, were 
all here with the dreariness of decay superadded. A few 
paces from the cabin there was a rough inclosure, which, 
in the brief days of Tennessee's Partner's matrimonial 
felicity, had been used as a garden, but was now overgrown 
with fern. As we approached it, we M^ere surprised to find 
that what we had taken for a recent attempt at cultivation 
was the broken soil about an open grave. 

The cart was halted before the inclosure, and rejecting 
the offers of assistance with the same air of simple self- 
reliance he had displayed throughout, Tennessee's Partner 
lifted the rough coffin on his back, and deposited it unaided 
within the shallow grave. He then nailed down the board 
which served as a lid, and mounting the little mound of 
earth beside it, took off his hat and slowly mopped his face 
with his handkerchief. This the crowd felt was a prelimi- 
nary to speech, and they disposed themselves variously on 
stumps and boulders, and sat expectant. 

''When a man," began Tennessee's Partner slowly, " has 
been running free all day, what 's the natural thing for him 
to do ? Why, to come home. And if he ain't in a condi- 
tion to go home, what can his best friend do ? Why, bring 
him home. And here 's Tennessee has been running free, 
and we brings him home from his wandering.'' He paused 
and picked up a fragment of quartz, rubbed it thoughtfully 
on his sleeve, and went on : *' It ain't the first time that 
I 've packed him on my back, as you see'd me now. It 
ain't the first time that I brought him to this yer cabin 
when he could n't help himself ; it ain't the first time that 
I and Jinny have waited for him on yon hill, and picked 
him up and so fetched him home, when he could n't speak 
and did n't know me. And now that it 's the last time, 
why " — he paused and rubbed the quartz gently on his 
sleeve — *' you see it 's sort of rough on his pardner. And 



62 TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 

now, gentlemen," he added abruptly, picking up his long- 
handled shovel, " the fun'l 's over ; and my thanks, and 
Tennessee's thanks, to you for your trouble." 

Resisting any proffers of assistance, he began to fill in 
the grave, turning his back upon the crowd, that after a 
few moments' hesitation gradually withdrew. As they 
crossed the little ridge that hid Sandy Bar from view, 
some, looking back, thought they could see Tennessee's 
Partner, his work done, sitting upon the grave, his shovel 
between his knees, and his face buried in his red bandana 
handkerchief. But it was argued by others that you 
could n't tell his face from his handkerchief at that dis- 
tance, and this point remained undecided. 

In the reaction that followed the feverish excitement of 
that day, Tennessee's Partner was not forgotten. A secret 
investigation had cleared him of any complicity in Tennes- 
see's guilt, and left only a suspicion of his general sanity. 
Sandy Bar made a point of calling on him, and proffering 
various uncouth but well-meant kindnesses. But from that 
day his rude health and great strength seemed visibly to 
decline ; and when the rainy season fairly set in, and the 
tiny grass-blades were beginning to peep from the rocky 
mound above Tennessee's grave, he took to his bed. 

One night, when the pines beside the cabin were swaying 
in the storm and trailing their slender fingers over the roof, 
and the roar and rush of the swollen river were heard below, 
Tennessee's Partner lifted his head from the pillow, saying, 
** It is time to go for Tennessee ; I must put Jinny in 
the cart" ; and would have risen from his bed but for the 
restraint of his attendant. Struggling, he still pursued his 
singular fancy: ^' There, now, steady, Jinny, — steady, old 
girl. How dark it is ! Look out for the ruts, — and look 
out for him, too, old gal. Sometimes, you know, when he 's 
blind drunk, he drops down right in the trail. Keep on 



TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 63 

straight up to the pine on the top of the hill. Thar ! I 
told you so! — thar he is, — coming this way, too, — all 
by himself, sober, and his face a-shiuing. Tennessee! 
Pardner ! " 

And so they met. 



THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 

Before nine o'clock it was pretty well known all along 
the river that the two parties of the *' Amity Claim '^ had 
quarreled and separated at daybreak. At that time the 
attention of their nearest neighbor had been attracted by 
the sounds of altercations and two consecutive pistol-shots. 
Kunning out, he had seen dimly in the gray mist that rose 
from the river the tall form of Scott, one of the partners, 
descending the hill toward the canon; a moment later, 
York, the other partner, had appeared from the cabin, and 
walked in an opposite direction toward the river, passing 
within a few feet of the curious watcher. Later it was dis- 
covered that a serious Chinaman, cutting wood before the 
cabin, had witnessed part of the quarrel. But John was 
stolid, indifferent, and reticent. ^' Me choppee wood, me 
no fightee," was his serene response to all anxious queries. 
" But what did they say, John ? '^ John did not sabe. 
Colonel Starbottle deftly ran over the various popular 
epithets which a generous public sentiment might accept as 
reasonable provocation for an assault. But John did not 
recognize them. '' And this yer 's the cattle," said the 
Colonel, with some severity, " that some thinks oughter 
be allowed to testify agin a White Man ! Git — you hea- 
then ! " 

Still the quarrel remained inexplicable. That two men, 



THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 65 

whose amiability and grave tact had earned for them the 
title of " The Peacemakers," in a community not greatly 
given to the passive virtues, — that these men, singularly 
devoted to each other, should suddenly and violently quar- 
rel, might well excite the curiosity of the camp. A few of 
the more inquisitive visited the late scene of conflict, now 
deserted by its former occupants. There was no trace of 
disorder or confusion in the neat cabin. The rude table 
was arranged as if for breakfast ; the pan of yellow biscuit 
still sat upon that hearth whose dead embers might have 
typified the evil passions that had raged there but an hour 
before. But Colonel Starbottle's eye, albeit somewhat 
bloodshot and rheumy, was more intent on practical details. 
On examination, a bullet-hole was found in the doorpost, 
and another nearly opposite in the casing of the window. 
The Colonel called attention to the fact that the one 
*' agreed with " the bore of Scott's revolver, and the other 
with that of York's derringer. " They must hev stood 
about yer," said the Colonel, taking position ; ^^ not more 'n 
three feet apart, and — missed ! " There was a fine touch 
of pathos in the falling inflection of the Colonel's voice, 
which was not without efi'ect. A delicate perception of 
wasted opportunity thrilled -his auditors. 

But the Bar was destined to experience a greater dis- 
appointment. The two antagonists had not met since the 
quarrel, and it was vaguely rumored that, on the occasion 
of a second meeting, each had determined to kill the other 
'* on sight." There ,was, consequently, some excitement — 
and, it is to be feared, no little gratification — when, at ten 
o'clock, York stepped from the Magnolia Saloon into the 
one long straggling street of the camp, at the same moment 
that Scott left the blacksmith's shop at the forks of the 
road. It was evident, at a glance, that a meeting could 
only be avoided by the actual retreat of one or the other. 

In an instant the doors and windows of the adjacent 



66 THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 

saloons were filled with faces. Heads unaccountably ap- 
peared above the river banks and from behind boulders. 
An empty wagon at the cross-road was suddenly crowded 
with people, wlio seemed to have sprung from the earth. 
There was much running and confusion on the hillside. 
On the mountain-road, Mr. Jack Hamlin had reined up his 
horse and was standing upright on the seat of his buggy. 
And the two objects of this absorbing attention approached 
each other. 

" York 's got the sun," '' Scott '11 line him on that tree," 
" He 's waiting to draw his fire," came from the cart ; and 
then it was silent. But above this human breathlessness 
the river rushed and sang, and the wind rustled the tree- 
tops with an indifl'erence that seemed obtrusive. Colonel 
Starbottle felt it, and in a moment of sublime preoccupa- 
tion, without looking around, waved his cane behind him 
warningly to all Nature, and said, " Shu ! " 

The men were now within a few feet of each other. A 
hen ran across the road before one of them. A feathery 
seed vessel, wafted from a wayside tree, fell at the feet of 
the other. And, unheeding this irony of Nature, the two 
opponents came nearer, erect and rigid, looked in each 
other's eyes, and — passed ! 

Colonel Starbottle had to be lifted from the cart. '^ This 
yer camp is played out," he said gloomily, as he affected to 
be supported into the Magnolia. With what further expres- 
sion he might have indicated his feelings it was impossible 
to say, for at that moment Scott joined the group. " Did 
you speak to me ? '^ he asked of the Colonel, dropping his 
hand, as if with accidental familiarity, on that gentleman's 
shoulder. The Colonel, recognizing some occult quality in 
the touch, and some unknown quantity in the glance of his 
questioner, contented himself by replying, ^' No, sir," with 
dignity. A few rods away, York's conduct was as charac- 
teristic and peculiar. ^'You had a mighty fine chance; 



THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 67 

why did n't you plump him ? " said Jack Hamlin, as York 
drew near the buggy. "Because I hate him/' was the 
reply, heard only by Jack. Contrary to popular belief, 
this reply was not hissed between the lips of the speaker, 
but was said in an ordinary tone. But Jack Hamlin, who 
was an observer of mankind, noticed that the speaker's 
hands were cold and his lips dry, as he helped him into the 
buggy, and accepted the seeming paradox with a smile. 

When Sandy Bar became convinced that the quarrel 
between York and Scott could not be settled after the usual 
local methods, it gave no further concern thereto. But 
presently it was rumored that the '' Amity Claim " was in 
litigation, and that its possession would be expensively dis- 
puted by each of the partners. As it was well known that 
the claim in question was " worked out " and worthless, and 
that the partners whom it had already enriched had talked 
of abandoning it but a day or two before the quarrel, this 
proceeding could only be accounted for as gratuitous spite. 
Later, two San Francisco lawyers made their appearance in 
this guileless Arcadia, and were eventually taken into the 
saloons, and — what was pretty much the same thing — the 
confidences of the inhabitants. The results of this unhal- 
lowed intimacy were many subpoenas ; and, indeed, when 
the " Amity Claim " came to trial, all of Sandy Bar that 
was not in compulsory attendance at the county seat came 
there from curiosity. The gulches and ditches for miles 
around were deserted. I do not propose to describe that 
already famous trial. Enough that, in the language of the 
plaintiff's counsel, " it was one of no ordinary significance, 
involving the inherent rights of that untiring industry 
which had developed the Pactolian resources of this golden 
land ; " and, in the homelier phrase of Colonel Starbottle, 
" a fuss that gentlemen might hev settled in ten minutes 
over a social glass, ef they meant business ; or in ten 
seconds with a revolver, ef they meant fun." Scott got a 



68 THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 

verdict, from which York instantly appealed. It was said 
that he had sworn to spend his last dollar in the struggle. 

In this way Sandy Bar began to accept the enmity of the 
former partners as a lifelong feud, and the fact that they 
had ever been friends was forgotten. The few who expected 
to learn from the trial the origin of the quarrel were dis- 
appointed. Among the various conjectures, that which 
ascribed some occult feminine influence as the cause was 
naturally popular in a camp given to dubious compliment 
of the sex. " My word for it, gentlemen,'' said Colonel 
Starbottle, who had been known in Sacramento as a Gentle- 
man of the Old School, " there 's some lovely creature at 
the bottom of this." The gallant Colonel then proceeded 
to illustrate his theory by divers sprightly stories, such as 
Gentlemen of the Old School are in the habit of repeating, 
but which, from deference to the prejudices of gentlemen 
of a more recent school, I refrain from transcribing here. 
But it would appear that even the Colonel's theory was 
fallacious. The only woman who personally might have 
exercised any influence over the partners was the pretty 
daughter of " old man Folinsbee," of Poverty Flat, at 
whose hospitable house — which exhibited some comforts 
and refinements rare in that crude civilization — both York 
and Scott were frequent visitors. Yet into this charming 
retreat York strode one evening a month after the quarrel, 
and, beholding Scott sitting there, turned to the fair hostess 
with the abrupt query, '^ Do you love this man ? " The 
young woman thus addressed returned that answer — at 
once spirited and evasive — which would occur to most of 
my fair readers in such an emergency. Without another 
word, York left the, house. "Miss Jo" heaved the least 
possible sigh as the door closed on York's curls and square 
shoulders, and then, like a good girl, turned to her insulted 
guest. " But would you believe it, dear ? " she afterwards 
related to an intimate friend, " the other creature, after 



THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 69 

glowering at me for a moment, got upon its hind legs, 
took its hat, and left too ; and that 's the last I 've seen of 
either." 

The same hard disregard of all other interests or feelings 
in the gratification of their hlind rancor characterized all 
their actions. When York purchased the land below Scott's 
new claim, and obliged the latter, at a great expense, to 
make a long detour to carry a " tail-race " around it, Scott 
retaliated by building a dam that overflowed York's claim 
on the river. It was Scott who, in conjunction with Colonel 
Starbottle, first organized that active opposition to the China- 
men which resulted in the driving ofi" of York's Mongolian 
laborers ; it was York who built the wagon-road and estab- 
lished the express which rendered Scott's mules and pack- 
trains obsolete ; it was Scott who called into life the Vigi- 
lance Committee which expatriated York's friend. Jack 
Hamlin ; it was York who created the " Sandy Bar Her- 
ald," which characterized the act as '^ a lawless outrage " 
and Scott as a '' Border Ruffian ; " it was Scott, at the head 
of twenty masked men, who, one moonlight night, threw the 
offending " forms " into the yellow river, and scattered the 
types in the dusty road. These proceedings were received 
in the distant and more civilized outlying towns as vague 
indications of progress and vitality. I have before me a 
copy of the ^' Poverty Flat Pioneer " for the week ending 
August 12, 1856, in which the editor, under the head of 
" County Improvements," says : " The new Presbyterian 
Church on C Street, at Sandy Bar, is completed. It stands 
upon the lot formerly occupied by the Magnolia Saloon, 
which was so mysteriously burnt last month. The temple, 
which now rises like a Phoenix from the ashes of the Mag- 
nolia, is virtually the free gift of H. J. York, Esq., of 
Sandy Bar, who purchased the lot and donated the lumber. 
Other buildings are going up in the vicinity, but the most 
noticeable is the ' Sunny South Saloon,' erected by Captain 



70 THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 

Mat. Scott, nearly opposite the church. Captain Scott has 
spared no expense in the furnishing of this saloon, which 
promises to be one of the most agreeable places of resort 
in old Tuolumne. He has recently imported two new firstf 
class billiard-tables with cork cushions. Our old friend, 
* Mountain Jimmy,' will dispense liquors at the bar. We 
refer our readers to the advertisement in another column. 
Visitors to Sandy Bar cannot do better than give ^ Jimmy ' 
a call." Among the local items occurred the following : 
" H. J. York, Esq., of Sandy Bar, has offered a reward of 
$100 for the detection of the parties who hauled away the 
steps of the new Presbyterian Church, C Street, Sandy Bar, 
during divine service on Sabbath evening last. Captain 
Scott adds another hundred for the capture of the mis- 
creants who broke the magnificent plate-glass windows of 
the new saloon on the following evening. There is some 
talk of reorganizing the old Vigilance Committee at Sandy 
Bar." 

When, for many months of cloudless weather, the hard, 
unwinking sun of Sandy Bar had regularly gone down on 
the unpacified wrath of these men, there was some talk of 
mediation. In particular, the pastor of the church to which 
I have just referred — a sincere, fearless, but perhaps not 
fully enlightened man — seized gladly upon the occasion of 
York's liberality to attempt to reunite the former partners. 
He preached an earnest sermon on the abstract sinfulness of 
discord and rancor. But the excellent sermons of the Rev. 
Mr. Daws were directed to an ideal congregation that did 
not exist at Sandy Bar, — a congregation of beings of un- 
mixed vices and virtues, of single impulses, and perfectly 
logical motives, of preternatural simplicity, of childlike 
faith, and grown-up responsibilities. As unfortunately the 
people who actually attended Mr. Daws' s church were mainly 
very human, somewhat artful, more self - excusing than 
self-accusing, rather good-natured, and decidedly weak, they 



THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 71 

quietly shed that portion of the sermon which referred to 
themselves, and accepting York and Scott — who were 
both in defiant attendance — as curious examples of those 
ideal beings above referred to, felt a certain satisfaction — 
which, I fear, was not altogether Christian-like — in their 
^' raking-down." If Mr. Daws expected York and Scott to 
shake hands after the sermon, he was disappointed. But 
he did not relax his purpose. With that quiet fearlessness 
and determination which had won for him the respect of 
men who were too apt to regard piety as synonymous with 
effeminacy, he attacked Scott in his own house. What he 
said has not been recorded, but it is to be feared that it was 
part of his sermon. When he had concluded, Scott looked 
at him, not unkindly, over the glasses of his bar, and said, 
less irreverently than the words might convey, " Young 
man, I rather like your style ; but when you know York 
and me as well as you do God Almighty, it '11 be time to 
talk." 

And so the feud progressed ; and so, as in more illus- 
trious examples, the private and personal enmity of two 
representative men led gradually to the evolution of some 
crude, half-expressed principle or belief. It was not long 
before it was made evident that those beliefs were identical 
with certain broad principles laid down by the founders of 
the American Constitution, as expounded by the statesmanlike 
A., or were the fatal quicksands on which the ship of state 
might be wrecked, warningly pointed out by the eloquent 
B. The practical result of all which was the nomination of 
York and Scott to represent the opposite factions of Sandy 
Bar in legislative councils. 

For some weeks past the voters of Sandy Bar and the 
adjacent camps had been called upon, in large type, to 
" Rally ! " In vain the great pines at the cross-roads — 
whose trunks were compelled to bear this and other legends 



72 THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 

— moaned and protested from their windy watch-towers. 
But one day, with fife and drum and flaming transparency, 
a procession filed into the triangular grove at the head of 
the gulch. The meeting was called to order by Colonel 
Starbottle, who, having once enjoyed legislative functions, 
and being vaguely known as " war-horse," was considered to 
be a valuable partisan of York. He concluded an appeal 
for his friend with an enunciation of principles, interspersed 
with one or two anecdotes so gratuitously coarse that the 
very pines might have been moved to pelt him with their 
cast-off cones as he stood there. But he created a laugh, on 
which his candidate rode into popular notice ; and when 
York rose to speak, he was greeted with cheers. But, to 
the general astonishment, the new speaker at once launched 
into bitter denunciation of his rival. He not only dwelt 
upon Scott's deeds and example as known to Sandy Bar, 
but spoke of facts connected with his previous career 
hitherto unknown to his auditors. To great precision of 
epithet and directness of statement, the speaker added the 
fascination of revelation and exposure. The crowd cheered, 
yelled, and were delighted ; but when this astounding 
philippic was concluded, there was a unanimous call for 
" Scott ! " Colonel Starbottle would have resisted this 
manifest impropriety, but in vain. Partly from a crude 
sense of justice, partly from a meaner craving for excitement, 
the assemblage was inflexible ; and Scott was dragged, 
pushed, and pulled upon the platform. As his frowsy head 
and unkempt beard appeared above the railing, it was 
evident that he was drunk. But it was also evident, before 
he opened his lips, that the orator of Sandy Bar — the one 
man who could touch their vagabond sympathies (perhaps 
because he was not above appealing to them) — stood before 
them. A consciousness of this power lent a certain dignity 
to his figure, and I am not sure but that his very phy- 
sical condition impressed them as a kind of regal unbending 



THE ILIA.D OF SANDY BAR 73 

and large condescension. Howbeit, when this unexpected 
Hector arose from this ditch, York's myrmidons trembled. 
** There 's naught, gentlemen,'' said Scott, leaning forward 
on the railing, — " there 's naught as that man hez said as 
is n't true. I was run outer Cairo ; I did belong to the 
Regulators ; I did desert from the army ; I did leave a 
wife in Kansas. But thar's one thing he didn't charge 
me with, and maybe he 's forgotten. For three years, 
gentlemen, I was that man's pardner ! " Whether he 
intended to say more, I cannot tell ; a burst of applause 
artistically rounded and enforced the climax, and virtually 
elected the speaker. That fall he went to Sacramento, 
York went abroad, and for the first time in many years 
distance and a new atmosphere isolated the old antagonists. 

With little of change in the green wood, gray rock, and 
yellow river, but with much shifting of human landmarks 
and new faces in its habitations, three years passed over 
Sandy Bar. The two men, once so identified with its 
character, seemed to have been quite forgotten. *' You 
will never return to Sandy Bar," said Miss Folinsbee, the 
" Lily of Poverty Flat," on meeting York in Paris, " for 
Sandy Bar is no more. They call it Riverside now ; and 
the new town is built higher up on the river bank. By the 
bye, ^ Jo ' says that Scott has won his suit about the ^ Amity 
Claim,' and that he lives in the old cabin, and is drunk half 
his time. Oh, I beg your pardon," added the lively lady, 
as a flush crossed York's sallow cheek ; '' but, bless me, I 
really thought that old grudge was made up. I 'm sure it 
ought to be." 

It was three months after this conversation, and a pleasant 
summer evening, that the Poverty Flat coach drew up be- 
fore the veranda of the Union Hotel at Sandy Bar. Among 
it3 passengers was one, apparently a stranger, in the local 
distinction of well-fitting clothes and closely shaven face, 
who demanded a private room and retired early to rest 



74 THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 

But before sunrise next morning he arose, and, drawing 
some clothes from his carpet-bag, proceeded to array himself 
in a pair of white duck trousers, a white duck overshirt, 
and straw hat. When his toilet was completed, he tied a 
red bandana handkerchief in a loop and threw it loosely 
over his shoulders. The transformation was complete. As 
he crept softly down the stairs and stepped into the road, 
no one would have detected in him the elegant stranger of 
the previous night, and but few have recognized the face 
and figure of Henry York, of Sandy Bar. 

In the uncertain light of that early hour, and in the 
change that had come over the settlement, he had to pause 
for a moment to recall where he stood. The Sandy Bar of 
his recollection lay below him, nearer the river ; the build- 
ings around him were of later date and newer fashion. As 
he strode toward the river, he noticed here a schoolhouse 
and there a church. A little farther on, the ^' Sunny 
South" came in view, transformed into a restaurant, its 
gilding faded and its paint rubbed off. He now knew 
where he was ; and running briskly down a declivity, 
crossed a ditch, and stood upon the lower boundary of the 
" Amity Claim." 

The gray mist was rising slowly from the river, clinging 
to the tree-tops and drifting up the mountain-side until it 
was caught among these rocky altars, and held a sacrifice to 
the ascending sun. At his feet the earth, cruelly gashed 
and scarred by his forgotten engines, had, since the old 
days, put on a show of greenness here and there, and now 
smiled forgivingly up at him, as if things were not so bad 
after all. A few birds were bathing in the ditch with a 
pleasant suggestion of its being a new and special provision 
of Nature, and a hare ran into an inverted sluice-box as he 
approached, as if it were put there for that purpose. 

He had not yet dared to look in a certain direction. 
But the sun was now high enough to paint the little emi- 



THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 75 

nence on which the cabin stood. In spite of his self-control, 
his heart beat faster as he raised his eyes toward it. Its 
window and door were closed, no smoke came from its adobe 
chimney, but it was else unchanged. When within a few 
yards of it, he picked up a broken shovel, and shouldering 
it with a smile, he strode toward the door and knocked. 
There was no sound from within. The smile died upon his 
lips as he nervously pushed the door open. 

A figure started up angrily and came toward him, — a 
figure whose bloodshot eyes suddenly fixed into a vacant 
stare, whose arms were at first outstretched and then thrown 
up in warning gesticulation, — a figure that suddenly gasped, 
choked, and then fell forward in a fit. 

But before he touched the ground, York had him out 
into the open air and sunshine. In the struggle, both fell 
and rolled over on the ground. But the next moment York 
was sitting up, holding the convulsed frame of his former 
partner on his knee, and wiping the foam from his inarticu- 
late lips. Gradually the tremor became less frequent and 
then ceased, and the strong man lay unconscious in his 
arms. 

For some moments York held him quietly thus, looking 
in his face. Afar, the stroke of a woodman's axe — a mere 
phantom of sound — was all that broke the stillness. High 
up the mountain, a wheeling hawk hung breathlessly above 
them. And then came voices, and two men joined them. 

" A fight ? '' No, a fit ; and would they help him bring 
the sick man to the hotel ? 

And there for a week the stricken partner lay, uncon- 
scious of aught but the visions wrought by disease and fear. 
On the eighth day at sunrise he rallied, and opening his 
eyes, looked upon York and pressed his hand ; and then he 
spoke : — 

" And it 's you. I thought it was only whiskey." 

York replied by only taking both of his hands, boyishly 



76 . THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 

working them backward and forward, as his elbow rested on 
the bed, with a pleasant smile. 

" And you 've been abroad. How did you like Paris ? " 

" So, so ! How did you like Sacramento ? '' 

« Bully ! '' 

And that was all they could think to say. Presently 
Scott opened his eyes again. 

" I 'm mighty weak." 

" You '11 get better soon." 

" Not much.'' 

A long silence followed, in which they could hear the 
sounds of wood-chopping, and that Sandy Bar was already 
astir for the coming day. Then Scott slowly and with 
difficulty turned his face to York and said, — 

" I might hev killed you once." 

" I wish you had." 

They pressed each other's hands again, but Scott's grasp 
was evidently failing. He seemed to summon his energies 
for a special effort. 

'' Old man ! " 

*< Old chap." 

" Closer ! " 

York bent his head toward the slowly fading face. 

" Do ye mind that morning ? " 

" Yes." 

A gleam of fun slid into the corner of Scott's blue eye as 
be whispered, — 

" Old man, thar was too much saleratus in that bread ! " 

It is said that these were his last words. For when the 
sun, which had so often gone down upon the idle wrath 
of these foolish men, looked again upon them reunited, it 
saw the hand of Scott fall cold and irresponsive from the 
yearning clasp of his former partner, and it knew that the 
feud of Sandy Bar was at an end. 



HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S 
BAR 

It had been raining in the valley of the Sacramento. 
The North Fork had overflowed its banks, and Rattlesnake 
Creek was impassable. The few boulders that had marked 
the summer ford at Simpson's Crossing were obliterated 
by a vast sheet of water stretching to the foothills. The 
up-stage was stopped at Granger's ; the last mail had been 
abandoned in the tules, the rider swimming for his life. 
" An area," remarked the " Sierra Avalanche," with pensive 
local pride, " as large as the State of Massachusetts is now 
under water." 

Nor was the weather any better in the foothills. The 
mud lay deep on the mountain road ; wagons that neither 
physical force nor moral objurgation could move from the 
evil ways into which they had fallen encumbered the track, 
and the way to Simpson's Bar was indicated by broken- 
down teams and hard swearing. And further on, cut off 
and inaccessible, rained upon and bedraggled, smitten by 
high winds and threatened by high water, Simpson's Bar, 
on the eve of Christmas Day, 1862, clung like a swallow's 
nest to the rocky entablature and splintered capitals of 
Table Mountain, and shook in the blast. 

As night shut down on the settlement, a few lights 
gleamed through the mist from the windows of cabins on 
either side of the highway, now crossed and gullied by 
lawless streams and swept by marauding winds. Happily 
most of the population were gathered at Thompson's store, 
clustered around a redhot stove, at which they silently spat 



78 HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON*S BAR 

in some accepted sense of social communion that perhaps 
rendered conversation unnecessary. Indeed, most methods 
of diversion had long since been exhausted on Simpson's 
Bar ; high water had suspended the regular occupations on 
gulch and on river, and a consequent lack of money and 
whiskey had taken the zest from most illegitimate recrea- 
tion. Even Mr. Hamlin was fain to leave the Bar with 
fifty dollars in his pocket — the only amount actually real- 
ized of the large sums won by him in the successful ex- 
ercise of his arduous profession. " Ef I was asked," he 
remarked somewhat later, — *' ef I was asked to pint out 
a purty little village where a retired sport as did n't care 
for money could exercise hisself, frequent and lively, I 'd 
say Simpson's Bar ; but for a young man with a large 
family depending on his exertions, it don't pay." As Mr. 
Hamlin's family consisted mainly of female adults, this 
remark is quoted rather to show the breadth of his humor 
than the exact extent of his responsibilities. 

Howbeit, the unconscious objects of this satire sat that 
evening in the listless apathy begotten of idleness and lack 
of excitement. Even the sudden splashing of hoofs before 
the door did not arouse them. Dick Bullen alone paused 
in the act of scraping out his pipe, and lifted his head, but 
no other one of the group indicated any interest in, or 
recognition of, the man who entered. 

It was a figure familiar enough to the company, and 
known in Simpson's Bar as " The Old Man." A man of 
perhaps fifty years ; grizzled and scant of hair, but still 
fresh and youthful of complexion. A face full of ready 
but not very powerful sympathy, with a chamsleon-like 
aptitude for taking on the shade and color of contiguous 
moods and feelings. He had evidently just Isft some 
hilarious companions, and did not at first notice the gravity 
of the group, but clapped the shoulder of the nearest man 
jocularly, and threw himself into a vacant chair. 



HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 79 

" Jest heard the best thing out, boys ! Ye know Smiley, 
over yar — Jim Smiley — funniest man in the Bar ? Well, 
Jim was jest telling the richest yarn about '' — 

" Smiley 's a fool," interrupted a gloomy voice. 

" A particular skunk," added another in sepulchral 

accents. 

A silence followed these positive statements. The Old 
Man glanced quickly around the group. Then his face 
slowly changed. *' That 's so," he said reflectively, after a 
pause, " certainly a sort of a skunk and suthin' of a fool. 
In course." He was silent for a moment, as in painful 
contemplation of the unsavoriness and folly of the un- 
popular Smiley. " Dismal weather, ain't it ? " he added, 
now fully embarked on the current of prevailing sentiment. 
** Mighty rough papers on the boys, and no show for money 
this season. And to-morrow 's Christmas." 

There was a movement among the men at this announce- 
ment, but whether of satisfaction or disgust was not plain. 
" Yes," continued the Old Man in the lugubrious tone he 
had, within the last few moments, unconsciously adopted, 
— "yes, Christmas, and to-night 's Christmas Eve. Ye see, 
boys, I kinder thought — that is, I sorter had an idee, jest 
passin' like, you know — that maybe ye 'd all like to come 
over to my house to-night and have a sort of tear round. 
But I suppose, now, you would n't ? Don't feel like it, 
maybe ? " he added with anxious sympathy, peering into 
the faces of his companions. 

" Well, I don't know," responded Tom Flynn with some 
cheerfulness. " P'r'aps we may. But how about your wife, 
Old Man ? What does she say to it ? " 

The Old Man hesitated. His conjugal experience had 
not been a happy one, and the fact was known to Simpson's 
Bar. His first wife, a delicate, pretty little woman, had 
suffered keenly and secretly from the jealous suspicions of 
her husband, until one day he invited the whole Bar to his 



80 HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAE 

house to expose her infidelity. On arriving, the party found 
the shy, petite creature quietly engaged in her household 
duties, and retired abashed and discomfited. But the sensi- 
tive woman did not easily recover from the shock of this 
extraordinary outrage. It was with difficulty she regained 
her equanimity sufficiently to release her lover from the 
closet in which he was concealed, and escape with him. 
She left a boy of three years to comfort her bereaved hus- 
band. The Old Man's present wife had been his cook. 
She was large, loyal, and aggressive. 

Before he could reply, Joe Dimmick suggested with 
great directness that it was the " Old Man's house," and 
that, invoking the Divine Power, if the case were his own, 
he would invite whom he pleased, even if in so doing he 
imperiled his salvation. The Powers of Evil, he further 
remarked, should contend against him vainly. All this 
delivered with a terseness and vigor lost in this necessary 
translation. 

" In course. Certainly. Thet 's it," said the Old Man 
with a sympathetic frown. " Thar 's no trouble about thet. 
It 's my own house, built every stick on it myself. Don't 
you be afeard o' her, boys. She may cut up a trifle rough 
— ez wimmin do — but she '11 come round." Secretly 
the Old Man trusted to the exaltation of liquor and the 
power of courageous example to sustain him in such an 
emergency. 

As yet, Dick Bullen, the oracle and leader of Simpson's 
Bar, had not spoken. He now took his pipe from his lips. 
" Old Man, how 's that yer Johnny gettin' on ? Seems to 
me he did n't look so peart last time I seed him on the 
bluff heavin' rocks at Chinamen. Did n't seem to take 
much interest in it. Thar was a gang of 'em by yar yester- 
day — drownded out up the river — and I kinder thought 
o' Johnny, and how he 'd miss 'em ! Maybe now, we 'd be 
in the way ef he wus sick ? " 



HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 81 

The father, evidently touched not only by this pathetic 
picture of Johnny's deprivation, but by the considerate deli- 
cacy of the speaker, hastened to assure him that Johnny 
was better, and that a "little fun might 'liven him up." 
Whereupon Dick arose, shook himself, and saying, ''I'm 
ready. Lead the way. Old Man : here goes," himself led 
the way with a leap, a characteristic howl, and darted out 
into the night. As he passed through the outer room he 
caught up a blazing brand from the hearth. The action 
was repeated by the rest of the party, closely following 
and elbowing each other, and before the astonished propri- 
etor of Thompson's grocery was aware of the intention of 
his guests, the room was deserted. 

The night was pitchy dark. In the first gust of wind 
their temporary torches were extinguished, and only the red 
brands dancing and flitting in the gloom like drunken will- 
o'-the-wisps indicated their whereabouts. Their way led 
up Pine-Tree Caiion, at the head of which a broad, low, 
bark-thatched cabin burrowed in the mountain-side. It 
was the home of the Old Man, and the entrance to the 
tunnel in which he worked when he worked at all. Here 
the crowd paused for a moment, out of delicate deference 
to their host, who came up panting in the rear. 

'' P'r'aps ye 'd better hold on a second out yer, whilst I 
go in and see that things is all right," said the Old Man, 
with an indifference he was far from feeling. The sugges- 
tion was graciously accepted, the door opened and closed on 
the host, and the crowd, leaning their backs against the 
wall and cowering under the eaves, waited and listened. 

For a few moments there was no sound but the dripping 
of water from the eaves, and the stir and rustle of wrestling 
boughs above them. Then the men became uneasy, and 
whispered suggestion and suspicion passed from the one to 
the other. " Reckon she 's caved in his head the first 
lick ! " '* Decoyed him inter the tunnel and barred him 



82 HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 

up, likely." ^' Got him down and sittin' on him." " Prob'ly 
biling suthin' to heave on us : stand clear the door, boys ! " 
For just then the latch clicked, the door slowly opened, 
and a voice said, '' Come in out o' the wet." 

The voice was neither that of the Old Man nor of his 
wife. It was the voice of a small boy, its weak treble 
broken by that preternatural hoarseness which only vaga- 
bondage and the habit of premature self-assertion can give. 
It was the face of a small boy that looked up at theirs, — 
a face that might have been pretty, and even refined, but 
that it was darkened by evil knowledge from within, and 
dirt and hard experience from without. He had a blanket 
around his shoulders, and had evidently just risen from his 
bed. "Come in," he repeated, "and don't make no noise. 
The Old Man 's in there talking to mar," he continued, 
pointing to an adjacent room which seemed to be a kitchen, 
from which the Old Man's voice came in deprecating ac- 
cents. "Let me be," he added querulously, to Dick Bul- 
len, who had caught him up, blanket and all, and was 
affecting to toss him into the fire, " let go o' me, you d — d 
old fool, d' ye hear ? " 

Thus adjured, Dick Bullen lowered Johnny to the 
ground with a smothered laugh, while the men, entering 
quietly, ranged themselves around a long table of rough 
boards which occupied the centre of the room. Johnny 
then gravely proceeded to a cupboard and brought out sev- 
eral articles, which he deposited on the table. "Thar's 
whiskey. And crackers. And red herons. And cheese." 
He took a bite of the latter on his way to the table. " And 
sugar." He scooped up a mouthful en route with a small 
and very dirty hand. " And terbacker. Thar 's dried 
appils too on the shelf, but I don't admire 'em. Appils is 
swellin'. Thar," he concluded, " now wade in, and don't 
be afeard. I don't mind the old woman. She don't b'long 
to me. S'long." 



HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 83 

He had stepped to the threshold of a small room, scarcely 
larger than a closet, partitioned off from the main apart- 
ment, and holding in its dim recess a small bed. He stood 
there a moment looking at the company, his bare feet peep- 
ing from the blanket, and nodded. 

** Hello, Johnny ! You ain't goin' to turn in agin, are 
ye ? " said Dick. 

" Yes, I are," responded Johnny decidedly. 

" Why, wot 's up, old fellow ? " 

" I 'm sick." 

*^How sick?'^ 

" I '\e got a fevier. And childblains. And roomatiz," 
returned Johnny, and vanished within. After a moment's 
pause, he added in the dark, apparently from under the 
bedclothes, — " And biles ! " 

There was an embarrassing silence. The men looked at 
each other and at the fire. Even with the appetizing ban- 
quet before them, it seemed as if they might again fall into 
the despondency of Thompson's grocery, when the voice of 
the Old Man, incautiously lifted, came deprecatingly from 
the kitchen. 

^' Certainly ! Thet 's so. In course they is. A gang 
o' lazy, drunken loafers, and that ar Dick Bullen 's the 
orneriest of all. Did n't hev no more sabe than to come 
round yar with sickness in the house and no provision. 
Thet 's what I said : ' Bullen,' sez I, ' it 's crazy drunk you 
are, or a fool,' sez I, ^ to think o' such a thing.' * Staples,' 
I sez, ^be you a man. Staples, and 'spect to raise h — 11 
under my roof and invalids lyin' round ? ' But they would 
come, — they would. Thet 's wot you must 'spect o' such 
trash as lays round the Bar." 

A burst of laughter from the men followed this unfortu- 
nate exposure. Whether it was overheard in the kitchen, 
or whether the Old Man's irate companion had just then 
exhausted all other modes of expressing her contemptuous 



84 HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 

indignation, I cannot say, but a back door was suddenly 
slammed with great violence. A moment later and the 
Old Man reappeared, haply unconscious of the cause of the 
late hilarious outburst, and smiled blandly. 

" The old woman thought she 'd jest run over to Mrs. 
MacFadden's for a sociable call," he explained with jaunty 
indifference, as he took a seat at the board. 

Oddly enough it needed this untoward incident to re- 
lieve the embarrassment that was beginning to be felt by 
the party, and their natural audacity returned with their 
host. I do not propose to record the convivialities of that 
evening. The inquisitive reader will accept the statement 
that the conversation was characterized by the same intel- 
lectual exaltation, the same cautious reverence, the same 
fastidious delicacy, the same rhetorical precision, and the 
same logical and coherent discourse somewhat later in the 
evening, which distinguish similar gatherings of the mascu- 
line sex in more civilized localities and under more favor- 
able auspices. No glasses were broken in the absence of 
any ; no liquor was uselessly spilt on the floor or table in 
the scarcity of that article. 

It was nearly midnight when the festivities were inter- 
rupted. " Hush," said Dick Bullen, holding up his hand. 
It was the querulous voice of Johnny from his adjacent 
closet : " dad ! " 

The Old Man arose hurriedly and disappeared in the 
closet. Presently he reappeared. '^ His rheumatiz is com- 
ing on agin bad," he explained, "and he wants rubbin'." 
He lifted the demijohn of whiskey from the table and 
shook it. It was empty. Dick Bullen put down his tin 
cup with an embarrassed laugh. So did the others. The 
Old Man examined their contents and said hopefully, " I 
reckon that 's enough ; he don't need much. You hold on 
all o' you for a spell, and I '11 be back ; " and vanished in 
the closet with an old flannel shirt and the whiskey. The 



HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 85 

door closed but imperfectly, and the following dialogue was 
distinctly audible : 

" Now, sonny, whar does she ache worst ? " 

" Sometimes over yar and sometimes under yer ; but it 's 
most powerful from yer to yer. Eub yer, dad." 

A silence seemed to indicate a brisk rubbing. Then 
Johnny ; 

" Hevin' a good time out yer, dad ? " 

" Yes, sonny." 

" To-morrer 's Chrism iss, — ain't it ? " 

" Yes, sonny. How does she feel now ? " 

" Better. Eub a little f urder down. Wot 's Chrismiss, 
anyway ? Wot 's it all about ? " 

« Oh, it 's a day." 

This exhaustive definition was apparently satisfactory, for 
there was a silent interval of rubbing. Presently Johnny 
again : 

" Mar sez that everywhere else but yer everybody gives 
things to everybody Chrismiss, and then she jist waded inter 
you. She sez thar 's a man they call Sandy Claws, not a 
white man, you know, but a kind o' Chinemin, comes down 
the chimbley night afore Chrismiss and gives things to 
chillern, — boys like me. Puts 'em in their butes ! Thet 's 
what she tried to play upon me. Easy now, pop, whar are 
you rubbin' to, — thet's a mile from the place. She jest 
made that up, did n't she, jest to aggrewate me and you ? 
Don't rub thar. . . . Why, dad ! " 

In the great quiet that seemed to have fallen upon the 
house the sigh of the near pines and the drip of leaves 
without was very distinct. Johnny's voice, too, w^as 
lowered as he went on, " Don't you take on now, for I 'm 
gettin' all right fast. Wot 's the boys doin' out thar ? " 

The Old Man partly opened the door and peered through. 
His guests were sitting there sociably enough, and there 
"Were a few silver coins and a lean buckskin purse on the 



86 HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 

table. " Bettin' on suthin' — some little game or 'nother. 
They 're all right," he replied to Johnny, and recommenced 
his rubbing. 

" I 'd like to take a hand and win some money," said 
Johnny reflectively after a pause. 

The Old Man glibly repeated what was evidently a 
familiar formula, that if Johnny would wait until he struck 
it rich in the tunnel he 'd have lots of money, etc., etc. 

" Yes," said Johnny, ^^ but you don't. And whether 
you strike it or I win it, it 's about the same. It 's all 
luck. But it 's mighty cur'o's about Chrismiss — ain't it ? 
Why do they call it Chrismiss ? " 

Perhaps from some instinctive deference to the overhear- 
ing of his guests, or from some vague sense of incongruity, 
the Old Man's reply was so low as to be inaudible beyond 
the room. 

"Yes," said Johnny, with some slight abatement of 
interest, " I 've heerd o' him before. Thar, that '11 do, 
dad. I don't ache near so bad as I did. Now wrap me 
tight in this yer blanket. So. Now," he ^dded in a 
muffled whisper, " sit down yer by me till I go asleep." 
To assure himself of obedience, he disengaged one hand 
from the blanket, and, grasping his father's sleeve, again 
composed himself to rest. 

For some moments the Old Man waited patiently. Then 
the unwonted stillness of the house excited his curiosity, 
and without moving from the bed he cautiously opened the 
door with his disengaged hand, and looked into the main 
room. To his infinite surprise it was dark and deserted. 
But even then a smouldering log on the hearth broke, and 
by the upspringing blaze he saw the figure of Dick BuUen 
sitting by the dying embers. 
" Hello ! " 

Dick started, rose, and came somewhat unsteadily toward 
liim. 



HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 87 

" Whar 's the boys ? '' said the Old Man. 

"Gone up the canon on a little pasear. They 're 
coming back for me in a minit. I 'm waitin' round for 'em. 
What are you starin' at, Old Man ? " he added, with a 
forced laugh ; *' do you think I 'm drunk ? " 

The Old Man might have been pardoned the supposition, 
for Dick's eyes were humid and his face flushed. He 
loitered and lounged back to the chimney, yawned, shook 
himself, buttoned up his coat and laughed. " Liquor ain't 
so plenty as that, Old Man. Now don't you git up," he 
continued, as the Old Man made a movement to release his 
sleeve from Johnny's hand. '' Don't you mind manners. 
Sit jest whar you be ; I 'm goin' in a jiffy. Thar, that 's 
them now." 

There was a low tap at the door. Dick Bullen opened 
it quickly, nodded '' Good- night" to his host, and disap- 
peared. The Old Man would have followed him but for 
the hand that still unconsciously grasped his sleeve. He 
could have easily disengaged it : it was small, weak, and 
emaciated. But perhaps because it was small, weak, and 
emaciated he changed his mind, and, drawing his chair 
closer to the bed, rested his head upon it. In this defense- 
less attitude the potency of his earlier potations surprised 
him. The room flickered and faded before his eyes, reap- 
peared, faded again, went out, and left him — asleep. 

Meantime Dick Bullen, closing the door, confronted his 
companions. " Are you ready ? " said Staples. " Keady," 
said Dick ; '^ what 's the time ? " ^^ Past twelve," was the 
reply ; " can you make it ? — it 's nigh on fifty miles, the 
round trip hither and yon." "I reckon," returned Dick 
shortly. " Whar 's the mare ? " " Bill and Jack 's 
holdin' her at the crossin'." " Let 'em hold on a minit 
longer," said Dick. 

He turned and reentered the house softly. By the light 
of the guttering candle and dying fire he saw that the door 



88 HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON S BAR 

of the little room was open. He stepped toward it on tip- 
toe and looked in. The Old Man had fallen back in his 
chair, snoring, his helpless feet thrust out in a line with his 
collapsed shoulders, and his hat pulled over his eyes. 
Beside him, on a narrow wooden bedstead, lay Johnny, 
muffled tightly in a blanket that hid all save a strip of 
forehead and a few curls damp with perspiration. Dick 
Bullen made a step forward, hesitated, and glanced over his 
shoulder into the deserted room. Everything was quiet. 
With a sudden resolution he parted his huge mustaches 
with both hands and stooped over the sleeping boy. But 
even as he did so a mischievous blast, lying in wait, swooped 
down the chimney, rekindled the hearth, and lit up the 
room with a shameless glow from which Dick fled in bash- 
ful terror. 

His companions were already waiting for him at the 
crossing. Two of them were struggling in the darkness 
with some strange misshapen bulk, which as Dick came 
nearer took the semblance of a great yellow horse. 

It was the mare. She was not a pretty picture. From 
her Koman nose to her rising haunches, from her arched 
spine hidden by the stiflf machillas of a Mexican saddle, to 
her thick, straight bony legs, there was not a line of equine 
grace. In her half-blind but wholly vicious white eyes, in 
her protruding under-lip, in her monstrous color, there was 
nothing but ugliness and vice. 

" Now then," said Staples, " stand cl'ar of her heels, 
boys, and up with you. Don't miss your first holt of her 
mane, and mind ye get your off stirrup quick. Ready ! " 

There was a leap, a scrambling struggle, a bound, a wild 
retreat of the crowd, a circle of flying hoofs, two springless 
leaps that jarred the earth, a rapid play and jingle of spurs, 
a plunge, and then the voice of Dick somewhere in the 
darkness. " All right ! " 

"Don't take the lower road back onless you're hard 



HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 89 

pushed for time ! Don't hold her in down hill We '11 be 
at the ford at five. G'lang ! Hoopa ! Mula ! GO ! " 

A splash, a spark struck from the ledge in the road, a 
clatter in the rocky cut beyond, and Dick was gone. 

Sing, O Muse, the ride of Kichard Bullen ! Sing, O 
Muse, of chivalrous men ! the sacred quest, the doughty 
deeds, the battery of low churls, the fearsome ride and grue- 
some perils of the Flower of Simpson's Bar ! Alack ! she 
is dainty, this Muse ! She will have none of this bucking 
brute and swaggering, ragged rider, and I must fain follow 
him in prose, afoot ! 

It was one o'clock, and yet he had only gained Kattle- 
snake Hill. For in that time Jovita had rehearsed to him 
all her imperfections and practiced all her vices. Thrice 
had she stumbled. Twice had she thrown up her Roman 
nose in a straight line with the reins, and, resisting bit and 
spur, struck out madly across country. Twice had she 
reared, and, rearing, fallen backward ; and twice had the 
agile Dick, unharmed, regained his seat before she found 
her vicious legs again. And a mile beyond them, at the 
foot of a long hill, was Rattlesnake Creek. Dick knew that 
here was the crucial test of his ability to perform his enter- 
prise, set his teeth grimly, put his knees well into her 
flanks, and changed his defensive tactics to brisk aggression. 
Bullied and maddened, Jovita began the descent of the hill. 
Here the artful Richard pretended to hold her in with 
ostentatious objurgation and well-feigned cries of alarm. 
It is unnecessary to add that Jovita instantly ran away. 
Nor need I state the time made in the descent ; it is written 
in the chronicles of Simpson's Bar. Enough that in another 
moment, as it seemed to Dick, she was splashing on the 
overflowed banks of Rattlesnake Creek. As Dick expected, 
the momentum she had acquired carried her beyond the 
point of balking, and, holding her well together for a 



90 HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 

mighty leap, they dashed into the middle of the swiftly 
flowing current. A few moments of kicking, wading, and 
swimming, and Dick drew a long breath on the opposite 
bank. 

The road from Rattlesnake Creek to Red Mountain was 
tolerably level. Either the plunge in Rattlesnake Creek 
had dampened her baleful fire, or the art which led to it 
had shown her the superior wickedness of her rider, for 
Jovita no longer wasted her surplus energy in wanton con- 
ceits. Once she bucked, but it was from force of habit ; 
once she shied, but it was from a new, freshly painted meet- 
ing-house at the crossing of the county road. Hollows, 
ditches, gravelly deposits, patches of freshly springing grasses, 
flew from beneath her rattling hoofs. She began to smell 
unpleasantly, once or twice she coughed slightly, but there 
was no abatement of her strength or speed. By two o'clock 
he had passed Red Mountain and begun the descent to 
the plain. Ten minutes later the driver of the fast Pioneer 
coach was overtaken and passed by a " man on a Pinto 
boss," — an event sufficiently notable for remark. At half 
past two Dick rose in his stirrups with a great shout. Stars 
were glittering through the rifted clouds, and beyond him, 
out of the plain, rose two spires, a flagstafi", and a straggling 
line of black objects. Dick jingled his spurs and swung 
his riatttf Jovita bounded forward, and in another moment 
they swept into Tuttleville, and drew up before the wooden 
piazza of '^ The Hotel of All Nations.^' 

What transpired that night at Tuttleville is not strictly a 
part of this record. Briefly I may state, however, that after 
Jovita had been handed over to a sleepy ostler, whom she 
at once kicked into unpleasant consciousness, Dick sallied 
out with the barkeeper for a tour of the sleeping town. 
Lights still gleamed from a few saloons and gambling-houses ; 
but, avoiding these, they stopped before several closed shops, 
and by persistent tapping and judicious outcry roused tho 



HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAK 91 

proprietors from their beds, and made them unbar the doors 
of their magazines and expose their wares. Sometimes they 
were met by curses, but oftener by interest and some con- 
cern in their needs, and the interview was invariably con- 
cluded by a drink. It was three o'clock before this pleas- 
antry was given over, and with a small waterproof bag of 
India-rubber strapped on his shoulders, Dick returned tc 
the hotel. But here he was waylaid by Beauty, — Beauty 
opulent in charms, affluent in dress, persuasive in speech, 
and Spanish in accent ! In vain she repeated the invitation 
in ^' Excelsior,'' happily scorned by all Alpine-climbing 
youth, and rejected by this child of the Sierras, — a rejection 
softened in this instance by a laugh and his last gold coin. 
And then he sprang to the saddle and dashed down the 
lonely street and out into the lonelier plain, where presently 
the lights, the black line of houses, the spires, and the flag- 
stafif sank into the earth behind him again and were lost in 
the distance. 

The storm had cleared away, the air was brisk and cold, 
the outlines of adjacent landmarks were distinct, but it was 
half-past four before Dick reached the meeting-house and 
the crossing of the county road. To avoid the rising grade 
he had taken a longer and more circuitous road, in whose 
viscid mud Jovita sank fetlock deep at every bound. It 
was a poor preparation for a steady ascent of five miles 
more ; but Jovita, gathering her legs under her, took it 
with her usual blind, unreasoning fury, and a half-hour later 
reached the long level that led to Rattlesnake Creek. 
Another half-hour would bring him to the creek. He threw 
the reins lightly upon the neck of the mare, chirruped to 
her, and began to sing. 

Suddenly Jovita shied with a bound that would have 
unseated a less practiced rider. Hanging to her rein was a 
figure that had leaped from the bank, and at the same time 
from the road before her arose a shadowy horse and rider. 



92 HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON S BAR 

" Throw up your hands," commanded the second appari- 
tion, with an oath. 

Dick felt the mare tremble, quiver, and apparently sink 
under him. He knew what it meant and was prepared. 

" Stand aside. Jack Simpson. I know you, you d — d 
thief ! Let me pass, or " — 

He did not finish the sentence. Jovita rose straight in 
the air with a terrific bound, throwing the figure from her 
bit with a single shake of her vicious head, and charged 
with deadly malevolence down on the impediment before 
her. An oath, a pistol-shot, horse and highwayman rolled 
over in the road, and the next moment Jovita was a hundred 
yards away. But the good right arm of her rider, shattered 
by a bullet, dropped helplessly at his side. 

Without slacking his speed he shifted the reins to his left 
hand. But a few moments later he was obliged to halt and 
tighten the saddle-girths that had slipped in the onset. 
This in his crippled condition took some time. He had 
no fear of pursuit, but looking up he saw that the eastern 
stars were already paling, and that the distant peaks had 
lost their ghostly whiteness, and now stood out blackly 
against a lighter sky. Day was upon him. Then com- 
pletely absorbed in a single idea, he forgot the pain of his 
wound, and mounting again dashed on toward Rattlesnake 
Creek. But now Jovita' s breath came broken by gasps, 
Dick reeled in his saddle, and brighter and brighter grew 
the sky. 

Ride, Richard ; run, Jovita ; linger, day ! 

For the last few rods there was a roaring in his ears. 
Was it exhaustion from loss of blood, or what ? He was 
dazed and giddy as he swept down the hill, and did not 
recognize his surroundings. Had he taken the wrong road, 
or was this Rattlesnake Creek ? 

It was. But the brawling creek he had swam a few 
hours before had risen, more than doubled its volume, and 



HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 93 

now rolled a swift and resistless river between him and 
Kattlesnake Hill. For the first time that night Kichard's 
heart sank within him. The river, the mountain, the 
quickening east, swam before his eyes. He shut them to 
recover his self-control. In that brief interval, by some 
fantastic mental process, the little room at Simpson's Bar 
and the figures of the sleeping father and son rose upon 
him. He opened his eyes wildly, cast off" his coat, pistol, 
boots, and saddle, bound his precious pack tightly to his 
shoulders, grasped the bare flanks of Jovita with his bared 
knees, and with a shout dashed into the yellow water. A 
cry rose from the opposite bank as the head of a man and 
horse struggled for a few moments against the battling cur- 
rent, and then were swept away amidst uprooted trees and 
whirling driftwood. 

The Old Man started and woke. The fire on the hearth 
was dead, the candle in the outer room flickering in its 
socket, and somebody was rapping at the door. He opened 
it, but fell back with a cry before the dripping, half-naked 
figure that reeled against the doorpost. 

"Dick?'' 

" Hush ! Is he awake yet ? " 

"No; but, Dick" — 

" Dry up, you old fool ! Get me some whiskey, quick ! " 
The Old Man flew and returned with — an empty bottle ! 
Dick would have sworn, but his strength was not equal to 
the occasion. He staggered, caught at the handle of the 
door, and motioned to the Old Man. 

"Thar's suthin' in my pack yer for Johnny. Take it 
ofi". I can't." 

The Old Man unstrapped the pack, and laid it before 
the exhausted man. 

" Open it, quick." 

He did so with trembling fingers. It contained only a 



94 HOW SANTA CLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 

few poor toys, — cheap and barbaric enough, goodness 
knows, but bright with paint and tinsel. One of them was 
broken ; another, I fear, was irretrievably ruined by water, 
and on the third — ah me ! there was a cruel spot. 

" It don't look like much, that 's a fact," said Dick rue- 
fully. . . . "But it's the best we could do. . . . Take 
'em. Old Man, and put 'em in his stocking, and tell him — 
tell him, you know — hold me. Old Man" — The Old 
Man caught at his sinking figure. " Tell him," said Dick, 
with a weak little laugh, — " tell him Sandy Glaus has 
come." 

And even so, bedraggled, ragged, unshaven and unshorn, 
with one arm hanging helplessly at his side, Santa Glaus 
came to Simpson's Bar and fell fainting on the first thresh- 
old. The Ghristmas dawn came slowly after, touching the 
remoter peaks with the rosy warmth of ineffable love. And 
it looked so tenderly on Simpson's Bar that the whole moun- 
tain, as if caught in a generous action, blushed to the skies. 



NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

JOHN BURNS OF GETTYSBURG 

John Burns (1793-1872) had fought in the war of 1812. 
He was seventy years old when he fought so bravely at 
Gettysburg. 

One of the qualities in human nature that Bret Harte never 
tires of delineating is that of unaffected virtue. The real 
hero is he who does his duty naturally; he does not stop to 
analyze his motives nor to commend — even in thought — 
his own behavior. Such a hero is the simple-hearted, unim- 
aginative John Burns. It was this trait in human nature of 
which Wordsworth was thinking when he wrote the Ode to 
Duty. 

LINE 

2 The assumption of the presence of a listener illustrates the 

dramatic sense in Bret Harte. 
11 very day. July 3. The first attack by General Lee was made 
on July 1. At the end of three days of fighting Lee was forced 
to retreat with a loss of 30,000 men. The union loss was 
23,000. 
14 Meade: General George Gordon Meade (1815-1872) was in 
command of the Army of the Potomac at the battle of 
Gettysburg. Bret Harte makes a rather poor pun on the 
word mead, which he conjoins with field. 
15-31 Is the dramatic quality in the character of John Burns 
increased or diminished by this emphasis upon the old 
farmer's lack of fancy? 
36-54 What details here lend most power to the description of 

the carnage? 
57-69 Of what value is this description of the old man's dress? 
What does it suggest in reference to his character? 
71 The veterans of the Peninsula were the soldiers who had 
been under the command of McClellan while he had been 
engaged in his campaign in which his objective design was 
the capture of Richmond. 
78 slangy repertoire: a storehouse of slang. 
89 ff. What was it that finally stopped the scoffs and jeers of the 
crowd? 



96 NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

LINE 

100 Many factions in France opposed Henry IV, known as 
Henry of Navarre, and leagued their soldiery against him. 
Led by the Duke of Mayenne these Leaguers attacked the 
king and his forces at Ivry in March, 1590. Before the battle 
Henry, with helmet adorned with a large white plume, spoke 
to his soldiers: " My children, if you lose sight of your colors, 
rally to my white plume: you will always find it in the path 
to honor and glory." 

Macaulay in his Battle of Ivry has told the story most 
dramatically, putting it into the mouth of a loyal French 
soldier. The third stanza follows: 

The king is come to marshal us, in all his armor dressed, 
And he has bound a snow-white plume upon his gallant crest; 
He looked upon his people, and a tear was in his eye; 
He looked upon the traitors, and his glance was stern and high. 
Right graciously he smiled on us, as rolled from wing to wing 
Down all our line, in deafening shout, "God save our lord, the King!" 
"And if my standard-bearer fall, as fall full well he may, — 
For never saw I promise yet of such a bloody fray, — 
Press where ye see my white plume shine, amidst the ranks of war, 
And be your oriflamme to-day the helmet of Navarre." 

108-111 Do you think the poem would be stronger if these last 
four lines were omitted? Why or why not? 

THE REVEILLE 

During the ten years preceding the Civil War, California 
was a scene of stirring political conflict. Northern and 
Southern feeling ran high, and it was for a time a serious 
question whether the State would support the Union. Thomas 
Starr King was one of the northern leaders who planned a mass 
meeting in San Francisco just after Lincoln had made his first 
call for volunteers. He asked Bret Harte to write a poem to 
be read at this meeting. The Reveille, often called The Drum, 
aroused tremendous enthusiasm; the vast audience in one 
prolonged and universal shout voiced its loyalty to the 
Union cause, and Bret Harte was its valiant recruiting agent. 
Neither the urgent demands of the domestic hearth nor the 
vision of the horrors of the impending conflict, could still 
the patriotic heart which leaped to respond to the reveille. 
Few poems of the war period are more spontaneous in their 
tone. 

What is there in the technique of the poem that is admirable? 

The patriotic spirit of the Californians of the war period 
is reflected in two of Bret Harte's stories, — Mrs. Bunker's 
Conspiracy and Clarence. 



NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 97 

RELIEVING GUARD 

LINE 

Thomas Starr King (1824-1864) was a famous Unitarian 
minister, author, and lecturer. He was born in New York 
City, but spent most of his hfe in Boston. Later when he 
became pastor of a church in San Francisco his most dis- 
tinguished service was in his successful endeavor to save Cali- 
fornia to the Union. He was a close friend of Bret Harte, and 
Bret Harte's second son, Francis King, was given his middle 
name in recognition of this friendship. 

The poem is one of the strongest that Mr. Harte has writ- 
ten. There is deep and intense feeling that is all the more 
affecting because the concise style holds the emotion in 
unsevere restraint. The effectiveness is increased by the 
dramatic conception, the dramatic setting and conversation, 
and finally by the religious note at the end. 
8 Is the pun on the other's name effective? Compare line 14 in 
John Burns of Gettysburg. 

ON A PEN OF THOMAS STARR KING 

To the student of American literature King is known by 
his book. The White Hills: their Legends, Landscapes, and 
Poetry, published in 1859. 

ANNIVERSARY POEM 

It is natural that this poem, written a few months after 
the Civil War, should most strongly reflect the spirit of that 
unhappy time and contrast the desolation and carnage of 
the East with the prosperity and peace of the Far West. 

1 native East: Bret Harte himself was from New York. Many 
settlers were from New England. Most of them were from 
the states east of the Mississippi. 

4 The darker tints were those of blood shed in the Civil War. 
14 The cicala (che-ka'la) is the Italian name for the cicada — 
an insect family represented by the seventeen-year locusts 
and similar insects. 

18 The long ditch here referred to holds the water used for 
irrigating purposes. 

19 sapper: builder of fortifications. 

23, 24 What is the answer to this question? 
33, 34 An allusion to the falling walls of Jericho. Cf. Joshua vii, 
20. 



98 NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

LINE 

45 Cf. Numbers xx, 9-11. 
64, 65 An allusion to the rainless season in California. 
74-81 Comment on the effectiveness of this simile. 

76 Mariposa: The county of California in which the Yosemite 
Falls are situated. 



A SANITARY MESSAGE 

There is carried out in A Sanitary Message a contrast 
similar to that in the Anniversary Poem. The author is 
thinking all the time of the sorrows of war that oppress the 
East. Notice how the military figure is kept up. Name all 
the varied items and designate their contrasts. 



CHIQUITA 

Browning and Bret Harte are both skilled in their handling 
of the dramatic monologue. The speaker's interposed remarks 
often suggest but do not exactly specify the actions that go 
on while the monologue continues. What, for example, is 
assumed to take place when in line 4 the owner of Chiquita 
says Ah, will you, you vixen ? 

5 Morgan: a breed of horses, famous for their endurance and 
swiftness. 

7 Tuolumne (pron. twol'um ne) : a county in central California. 

9 savey: a corruption of the Spanish saber, " to know." Savey 
here means knowledge and experience — good sense. What 
action occasions the remark, — " Quit that foolin' " ? 
13 leaders: the forward pair of horses. 

30 The rather grim humor of this line is characteristic of Bret 
Harte. 



PLAIN LANGUAGE FROM TRUTHFUL JAMES 

This poem, popularly known under the title of The Heathen 
Chinee, was first published in the Overland Monthly in Sep- 
tember, 1870. Its melody (the technical form is borrowed 
from Swinburne) immediately caught the public ear, and 
did more than any one thing to make Bret Harte's name 
familiar to the people. 

" Truthful James, himself,^ who tells the story was a real 

» Henry C. Merwin: The Life of Bret Harte, p. 50. 



NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 99 

LINE 

character, — nay is, for at the writing of these pages (1911), 
he still lives in the same little shanty where he was to be 
found when Bret Harte knew him. At that time, in 1856, or 
thereabout, Bret Harte was teaching school at Tuttletown, a 
few miles north of Sonora, and Truthful James, Mr. James W. 
Gillis, lived over the hill from Tuttletown, at a place called Jack- 
ass Flat. Mr. Gillis was well known and highly respected in all 
that neighborhood, and he figures not only in Bret Harte's 
poetry, but also in Mark Twain's works, where he is described 
as * The Sage of Jackass Hill.' " 

There is no deep meaning in the poem; it simply tells a 
humorous story humorously. Californian duplicity is met 
by Chinese duplicity, and this last is then dutifully punished 
by Bill Nye. The swing of the verse is infectious, and there is 
enough that is clever and peculiar in the phrasing to attract 
and please. All these facts explain its popularity. It is a 
pleasure to add that Bret Harte himself always held the 
poem in slight regard. 

THE SOCIETY UPON THE STANISLAUS 

This is one of Bret Harte's earlier poems, written, he tells 
us, sometime before 1867 and first printed in Ambrose Bierce'e 

News Letter. 

This poem illustrates in line 28 what is a distinctive phase 
of Bret Harte's humor, — a tendency not to exaggerate but 
rather to minimize. Instead of saying that the chunk of 
red sandstone killed Abner Dean (or perhaps he was not 
killed, but merely knocked senseless) he cautiously reduces 
the expression and simply remarks that " the subsequent 
proceedings interested him no more." However, the minimiz- 
ing is so strong that it suggests exaggeration. 

11 Brown of Calaveras: Bret Harte's short story, Brown of 
Calaveras, portrays this character very fully. He is a large- 
framed man with a character weakened by dissipation. 

25 Abner Dean appears as a character in two of Bret Harte's 
stories, A Monte Flat Pastoral and Cressy. 



A GREYPORT LEGEND 

This poem was first published in the Atlantic Monthly in 
1871. It is one of the few poems in which Bret Harte gives 
his theme a religious turn. Religion, indeed, seems to have 



100 NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

LINE 

had no great dominating influence upon him. In the closing 
stanza of this poem, however, the cry of the children who are 
dead seems to beget a faith that draws " the soul to its 
anchorage." 
25 The definite appeal to the sense of sound by the mention 
of these two items is all the more trenchant because of the 
brooding silence suggested in line 24. 

SAN FRANCISCO 

This poem was Bret Harte's first contribution to the 
Overland. It is a frank admission of the city's faults, its 
cunning, its greed, its lust, its worship of material grandeur. 
Yet these do not generate in the writer the feeling of hope- 
lessness for the future. Ultimately Art and Culture will 
efface all this. 

What is the significance of the parenthetical under-title? 
5 Comment on the phrase, — the white seas strike their tents. 

11 lion's whelp: The spirit of the city is the spirit of savagery. 

18 skeptic sneer: her irreligion. 

20 Franciscan Brotherhood: In Bret Harte's stories there is 
frequent allusion to Junip^ro Serra, the Franciscan friar who 
was the first Catholic missionary in California. 

36 It is apparent that the poet did not expect the regeneration 
of San Francisco to come during the life of his own contem- 
poraries. 

THE MOUNTAIN HEART'S-EASE 

The interesting point in this nature poem is the comparison 
of the function of the flower with the function of the poet. 

TO A SEA-BIRD 

This poem reveals to the imagination a long stretch of 
beach and sea, the slow sailing or the lazy rocking of the bird, 
and the lonely poet musing on his limitations. He compares 
and contrasts his life with that of the sea-bird. 
2 In what sense is the bird a vagabond ? 
3, 4 Is the poet heedless of the surf, the bar, and the shale? 

5 Why does the poet ask for this company ? 
5-10 Is the poet right in considering such a life monotonous? 
10-15 What is the limitation of each? 



NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 101 

LINE 

15-20 Contrast the desire of each. 
18 shingle : loose gravel and small stones worn smooth by the 
water. 

What do you think of the meter of this poem and its 
adaptation to the theme ? 

WHAT THE CHIMNEY SANG 

This poem well illustrates the different feelings which the 
same phenomenon will arouse in different persons. How do 
you account for this difference? 

5 forced: Can you justify the false rhyme? 

6 Why did the woman hate the wind? 

10-12 Is there any connection between the witch and the fairy? 
15 What is your idea of the character and social position of this 

man? 
22, 23 In what way was the poet all three? Of the four, who got 

most joy from the sound? who got least? 



DICKENS IN CAMP 

" When news of the death of Dickens reached Bret Harte 
he was camping in the Foot-Hills far from San Francisco, but 
he sent a telegram to hold back for a day the printing of the 
Overland, then ready for the press, and his poem was written 
that night and forwarded the next morning." — Merwin. 

There is no question of Bret Harte's admiration for Dick- 
ens. Aside from the sincere and tender praise in this poem, 
there are frequent scenes and passages in his stories which 
reveal — perhaps unconsciously — the methods and devices 
of Dickens. And this is a silent but expressive tribute of the 
younger to the older author. It is pleasant to add to this the 
regard of Dickens for Harte. Among the last letters that 
Dickens wrote was one in which he invited Bret Harte to 
contribute a story to " All the Year Round." 

The most marked characteristics of Dickens in Camp is 
the brooding sense of heart-tribute felt in each line. This deep 
but restrained emotion and the sweet melody of the verse 
make the poem immortal. The method employed is tribute 
by effect. We are not told directly that Dickens is an inter- 
esting story-teller ; instead we are made to feel the silent 
tension of this interest on the faces of the miners grouped 
about that western camp-fire. 



102 NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

LINE 

10 What was the title of this volume ? Why hoarded f 

30 Note the significance of the interrogation point. 

31 Kentish: Dickens's home, during the last ten years of his 
life, was at Gad's Hill, in Kent. 

37-40 Express in your own words the thought of this last stanza. 



THE MISSION BELLS OF MONTEREY 

This is the most purely lyrical poem that Bret Harte has 
written, and is the only one — so far as the present editor is 
aware — that has been set to music. The composer is Mon- 
sieur Charles Gounod. 

Monterey is a small village in Monterey County, Cali- 
fornia. In 1770 the Spaniards established a mission. The 
picturesqueness of missions appealed strongly to Bret Harte, 
and he reflects this appeal in this poem. The Angelus, and 
in many of his stories. 

Monterey is situated about ninety miles southeast of San 
Francisco. Here the San Carlos mission was formally estab- 
lished in June, 1770. The bells, brought from Spain, were an 
important feature. Some were of bronze and others of silver, 
and there was an effective variety in their tones. The mission 
during the process of years sunk into decay, but it was re- 
stored in 1882. 
3 reddened: referring to the color of the soil. • 

5 Explain the line. 

6 Eleison: In the mass we have the expression, Christe Eleison! 
May the Lord have mercy! Bret Harte uses the word here as 
an adjective, suggesting that the bells are calling to divine, 
worship. 

8-14 Why this discord? 

THE ANGELUS 

Bret Harte's interest in the missions is seen in the preceding 
poem. 

The Mission Dolores is often called San Francisco de Asis, 
after St. Francis of Assisi. The Mission Dolores takes its 
name from the Dolores — a stream which has since dried up. 
18 Presidio : a fortified building. Each of these Spanish Missions 
was protected by military guard. The monks expected to use 
these soldiers to force conversion of the Indians, if force were 



NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 103 

LINE 

found necessary. The California Indians were peaceable, 
however, and were easily converted, 
21 Portola: Portold was the Spanish governor in California at 
the time of the founding of the first missions. He cooperated 
with the Franciscan fathers. The Mission Dolores was 
founded June 17, 1776. 

Laura Bride Powers in The Missions of California speaks of 
the quaint adobe chapel of Mission Dolores as " the precious 
link that joins our civiHzation of to-day with the romantic 
mission period." 



THE LUCK OF ROARING CAMP 

The Luck of Roaring Camp was the first great literary 
success of Bret Harte's, and from the date of its publication 
in the Overland Monthly in 1868 it has steadily maintained its 
immediately acquired popularity. 

This popularity may be accounted for partly because of its 
vivid portrayal of California mining life — local color, if we 
wish to employ a very much overworked compound — and 
partly because of its evidently sincere sentiment. It is prob- 
ably true that popular taste was caught by the first and has 
been since held by the second. The story is in Bret Harte's 
most characteristic vein — it shows elemental virtue existent 
behind crudeness of manner, dress, and speech. The uncouth- 
ness of the mining camp is invested with a certain ideal grace 
which the presence of a child mysteriously fashions. 

PAGE 

26 primal curse: Cf. Gen. iii, 16. 

first transgression: the eating of the forbidden fruit in the 
Garden of Eden. 

27 ab initio : from the beginning, 
putative: supposed. 

28 until it was lost in the stars above : phrase effective in enforc- 
ing the ascension of the road. 

The pines stopped, etc. : Find in Bret Harte other examples 
of the sympathy of nature with the moods of men. 

29 Romulus and Remus: These legendary founders of Rome 
were, according to story, suckled by a wolf and thus pre- 
served from death. 

derringer: a kind of pistol. 

doubloon: a Spanish coin varying in value from five to fifteen 

dollars. 



104 NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

PAGE 

30 slung-shot: a metal ball, with a string attached, used as a 

weapon. 

rastled: a corruption of wrestled. 
32 " The Coyote ": This animal impressed Bret Harte. Cf. his 

poem. Coyote. 

35 Cockney Simmons: In Tennessee's Partner we get a notion 
of how names are applied. Simmons was evidently a native 
of Greenwich, England, and spoke a cockney dialect. 
Mariposas: Spanish for butterfly. The word is here applied to 
a kind of flower whose petals have the iris of a butterfly's wing. 

36 albeit there was an infantine gravity, etc.: This detail is 
evidently meant to be a slight foreshadowing of Luck's 
tragic end. 

38 Note that Bret Harte does not prolong the conclusion of his 
story. He closes with the evidence of Kentuck's splendid 
loyalty and sacrifice, and allows the reader's mind to dwell 
on that significant detail. The feeling of the camp is evident 
though unmentioned. 

THE OUTCASTS OF POKER FLAT 

Bret Harte as a story-teller sometimes seems as aloof and 
impersonal as a photographer. In The Outcasts of Poker Flat 
he does not seem to be as much concerned with the desire to 
portray beauty as he is with the desire to portray truth. If 
ugliness chances to come within the sweep of his camera and 
to reveal itself on the sensitized film, Bret Harte does not in 
the printing blot out the smutches. Uncle Billy is a thief and 
his thievery is exposed. The Duchess and Mother Shipton 
show the evil of their past lives. John Oakhurst commits 
suicide, and this act is frankly revealed. The artist having 
once chosen a site on which to set up his tripod and camera, 
lets the mechanism disclose what realities lie within its range. 
But even so, it is quite evident that the site is chosen with a 
deliberate plan to hide the most pronounced ugliness and, in 
the case of the gambler and the women, to picture them at 
their best. To have pictured them in their entirety would 
have offended our higher taste. Art is always selective. 

It is interesting to note further, that these successive 
exposures are made not so much to reveal scenes as to reveal 
character. Nor do we feel that the characters themselves are 
very different at the end from what they are at the beginning. 
We simply see them in the fortuitous situation that reveals 
their charm, their tenderness, their sacrificial intent. 



NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 105 

PAGE 

Poker Flat was in Sierra County, California, and frequently 
witnessed just such a storm as is here described. 

40 He was too much of a gambler, etc.: Bret Harte, though 
never a gambler himself, is fond of portraying the type. There 
were elements in such gamesters as Jack Hamlin and Mr. 
Oakhurst that strongly appealed to our author. They were 
good losers; they were generous; they were free from cant. 
And these traits certainly are saving graces. Then, too, as 
long as Bret Harte was portraying the life of the Forty 
Niners he could not omit the gambler-group. 

40 Parthian volley: The Parthians, who occupied Parthia, in 
Asia, were accustomed to shoot their arrows at enemies in 
retreat. A Parthian shot is, therefore, a parting shot. 

44 Suddenly an idea: What idea had just come to Uncle Billy? 

45 his usual calm: Perhaps no trait in Mr. Oakhurst's character 
is more striking than his calmness. And it is his perfect com- 
posure that gives him dominance. Note how it contrasts 
with the gayety of the Innocent. 

46 cached: hidden. 

47 Covenanter: The covenanters were a group of Scotchmen 
strong in their Presbyterian faith who, leagued together 
stood up stoutly against the oppression of Charles I. 
nigger-luck: illogically good luck. It was used by the miners 
to characterize the luck which came to the ignorant and the 
incapacitated as opposed to the wise and the judicious. 

48 Mr. Pope's ingenious translation of the Iliad: The term 
ingenious is justified because Pope's translation is very free 
and inaccurate. The famous remark of Richard Bentley was 
" a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not call it Homer." 
argument: outline of the story. 

son of Peleus: Achilles. Cf. Classical Dictionary. Note the 
Innocent's pronunication. 

49 Is Mother Shipton's death due to suicide deliberately planned 
because she wanted release from life; or is it due to her desire 
to make a sacrifice ? 

Comment on Bret Harte's skill in portraying character. 
By what means does he make us feel the supreme domination 
of Oakhurst over the other members of the company ? Note 
how Piney acts as a character foil to the Duchess and Mother 
Shipton, and " The Innocent " to Mr. Oakhurst. What is 
Mother Shipton's favorite way of revealing her animosity 
to the rulers of Poker Flat ? Comment on the part which 
nature plays in this story. Is the tragic end of the story in 
anyway foreshadowed ? 



106 NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

TENNESSEE'S PARTNER 

PAGE 

Tennessee's Partner was, like most of Bret Harte's stories, 
suggested by a real incident, but as the following item from 
a California newspaper ^ of June, 1903, shows, Mr. Harte has 
considerably deepened the shadows: 

" J. A. Chaffee, famous as the original of Tennessee's Partner, 
has been brought to an Oakland Sanitarium. He has been 
living since 1849 in a small Tuolumne county mining camp 
with his partner Chamberlain. In the early days he saved 
Chamberlain from the vigilance committee by a plea to Judge 
Lynch when the vigilantes had a rope around the victim's 
throat. . . . Chamberlain was accused of stealing the 
miner's gold, but Chaffee cleared him, as every one believed 
Chaffee. The two men settled down to live where they have 
remained ever since, washing out enough placer gold to 
maintain them. . . . Both men are over eighty." 

In one of Bret Harte's lectures ^ — the one on the Argo- 
nauts — he tells us of the splendid loyalty of the friendships 
among miners : — 

" To be a man's * partner ' signified something more than 
a common pecuniary or business interest; it was to be his 
friend through good or ill report, in adversity, or fortune, to 
cleave to him and none other — to be ever jealous of him! 
... To insult a man's partner was to insult him; to step 
between two partners in a quarrel was attended with the 
same danger and uncertainty that involves the peacemaker 
in a conjugal dispute. ... In these unions there were the 
same odd combinations often seen in the marital relations: 
a tall and a short man, a delicate sickly youth and a middle- 
aged man of powerful frame, a grave reticent nature and a 
spontaneous exuberant one. Yet in spite of these incongru- 
ities there was always the same blind unreasoning fidelity to 
each other." 

Bret Harte has revealed this feeling of loyalty in friendship in 
Captain Jim's Friend, In the Tules, Uncle Jim and Uncle Billy ^ 
and in several of his poems, but nowhere are abiding loyalty 
and elemental stanchness revealed more strongly than in 
Tennessee's Partner. The grimness of the story is relieved 
by the pathos of masculine devotion — stalwart and unde- 
viating and tender. 

» See Merwin's Life of Bret Harte (p. 165). Houghton Mifflin Company. 
2 Published as an Introduction to Tales of the Argonauts. Houghton Mifflin 
Company. 



ITOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 107 

PAGE 
52 Boston: Bret Harte uses his characters over and over again. 
In The Luck of Roaring Camp there is a noted wag of this 
name who prepares the burlesque christening service. There 
is also a Boston — perhaps the same one — in The Poet of the 
Sierra Flat. 

54 gambler's epigram: Note in The Outcasts of Poker Flat, also, 
Mr. Oakhurst's expressive gambling metaphors. Bret Harte's 
friend, Thomas Starr King, the famous San Francisco divine, 
one Sunday after he had preached a strong controversial 
sermon overheard an enthusiastic parishioner question a 
friend, — " Well, what do you think of King now ? " '' Think 
of him," responded his friend, ''why, he took every trick." 
chaparral-crested: Chaparral (Span.) an evergreen oak tree, 
but used to describe any dense thicket of low bushes. 

55 Study the descriptive paragraph at the top of this page and 
note the skill shown in the selection of items which give 
significance to the scene. 

56 trousers had been patched: In Bret Harte's story — Left out 
on Lone Star Mountain — one of the characters is nicknamed 
" Union Mills," because at one time a patch on his trousers 
had borne that legend. Cf. the beginning of Tennessee^ s 
Partner to note how nicknames were often applied. 

57 Did the miner offer the money as a bribe, or simply as a 
recompense for losses ? 

59 Bret Harte's use of nature is one of the interesting devices 
employed. Comment on the effect here produced. 

60 sluicing: a sluice or sluice-box was a trough used by miners 
in washing the earth to find gold. 

Jack Folinsbee : See Bret Harte's An Heiress of Red Dog and 
The Romance of Madrono Hollow. 

See comment on the second paragraph of this page on page 
XV of the Introduction. 

62 his face buried in his red bandana handkerchief: Bret Harte 
is skilful in the suggestion of pathos; he never allows himself 
to dwell on pathetic scenes — a glimpse, and the curtain is 
drawn. 

63 Comment on the ending. 

THE ILIAD OF SANDY BAR 

This story shows the ultimate loyalty of friendship be- 
tween partners, — a loyalty triumphing over a long period 
of separation and hostility. A slight incident — humorous in 
its triviality — makes the breach, which widens and deepens 



108 NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

PAGE 

with the years. The prosperity of York helps finally to 
soften his belligerent spirit, and he returns to Sandy Bar to 
seek out his old friend Scott. The story closes with their 
reconciliation, — grim but complete, — and a smile plays with 
a deeper emotion as we learn only in the presence of death 
that the partnership was broken and their lives sundered 
merely because there was ** too much saleratus " in the bis- 
cuits which York had baked. The most striking charac- 
teristic of the story is the skilful intermingling of sly humor 
and reserved pathos. 

65 pan of yellow biscuit : Where is the significance of this detail 
seen by the reader? Note that Bret Harte by introducing 
few items into his description of the cabin as it appeared on 
the morning of the quarrel allows a proper amount of em- 
phasis to fall unobtrusively upon this detail. 

Colonel Starbottle: One of the most striking and most 
ubiquitous of Bret Harte's characters. This chivalrous 
Kentucky colonel plays an important rdle in a score of the 
author's stories. Bret Harte had written two short paragraphs 
of A Friend of Colonel Starbottle' s just before his last illness, 
but the story, barely begun, remained incomplete. 

66 Jack Hamlin: He shares with Colonel Starbottle the honor 
of popularity and frequency of appearance in Bret Harte's 
stories. His gambling propensities lead him into many scenes 
and adventures, and through them all he preserves a calm- 
ness and a dexterity that win admiration even from his 
enemies. He is especially popular with women and children, 
said " Shu." A sly bit of humor that helps to portray the 
colonel's character, 

67 seeming paradox: What was the paradox? 
guileless Arcadia: Explain the sarcasm. 

Pactolian: pertaining to Pactolus, a river in Lydia whose 
waters, touched by Midas, made the river sands golden. 

68 Emphasis upon the cause of the quarrel helps to increase the 
humor of the denouement. 

pretty daughter of "old man Folinsbee": Old man Folinsbee 
is a Yankee who moves to California. He appears as a char- 
acter in The Romance of Madrono Hollow. The daughter also 
figures in the same story. Read the poems Her Letter, His 
Answer to her Letter, and Her Last Letter. These all deal with 
the affairs of Miss Jo Folinsbee and her lover Joe. 

72 philippic: consult the dictionary for meaning and derivation. 

73 Hector — myrmidons: Hector, the Trojan, was defeated by 
Patroclus, the Greek, and his Myrmidons. 



NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 109 

PAGE 

Lily of Poverty Flat: so called in the poem, Her Letter. 
* Jo *: the lover of the Lily oj Poverty Flat. 
76 Sacramento: where Scott had gone to the legislature after 
defeating York. 



HOW SANTA GLAUS CAME TO SIMPSON'S BAR 

One of the recurring themes in literature is that of sacrifice 
for the sake of a child's happiness. Whatever is crude, or un- 
couth or ethically awry in the character of Dick BuUen is 
immediately pardoned — forgotten almost — because he 
was willing to undergo hardship and face danger in order 
that he might give to the little boy at Sandy Bar the joy of 
those first Christmas toys. The story emphasizes a faith 
which was inherent in Bret Harte, — the essential virtue 
and tenderness that a rude environment could not destroy. 

78 Dick Bullen, " the oracle and leader of Simpson's Bar," is 
also introduced as a character in Uncle Jim and Uncle Billy, 
where his taunts tend to make Uncle Jim discontented with 
his life at Cedar Camp. 

79 Tom Flynn: a Virginia miner who also plays a part in The 
Fool of Five Forks. 

82 a face . . . evil knowledge from within: When Horace 
Greeley visited California in 1859 he was particularly im- 
pressed with the evils surrounding the children. He saw the 
need of education and wrote that there ought to be two 
thousand good common schools in operation but he feared 
there would not be six hundred. Boys grew up on the streets 
and were early subjected to the temptation of the evil environ- 
ment of that rough and irreligious pioneer life. 

83 orneriest: the superlative of ornery, generally explained as a 
corruption of ordinary. The word, however, was always con- 
temptuously applied. 

sabe: Spanish saber, to know; equivalent to sense. 

84ff. Oddly enough, etc.: Mr. Harte's humor is here that of 
obvious and refined exaggeration. 

85 Why, dad ! Bret Harte's use of pathos is almost always brief 
and intermittent. He merely suggests the emotion and artis- 
tically refrains from dwelling upon it. 
In the quiet, etc. : note the harmonizing effect of nature's mood. 

87 pasear: Spanish for walk or promenade. 
87,88 He turned and reentered the house : Study this paragraph 
to discover the means employed to secure the vivid effect. 



110 NOTES, COMMENTS, AND QUESTIONS 

PAGE 

88 machillas: The present editor has been unable to find the ex- 
act meaning of this word, as it is explained in none of the refer- 
ence books to which he has had access. It is probably a hybrid 
locally used to refer to a portion of the saddle which sits close 
to the horse's back. 

oflf stimip : right stirrup. The left side of a horse is the near 
side. 

89 Sing, O Muse, etc. : an imitation of the beginnings of classic 
epics. Cf. Homer and Virgil. 

90 Pinto hoss: mottled, piebald. Elsewhere Bret Harte spells 
it without the capital. 

riata: lariat. 

91 invitation in " Excelsior." Cf. Longfellow's Excelsior: — 

"O stay," the maiden said, " and rest 

Thy weary head upon this breast!". 

A tear stood in his bright blue eye 

And still he answered with a eigh, 

Excelsior! 



jRiber^itie Hiterature M^ttxt^— continued 

82. Hawthorne's Twice-Told Tales. Paper, .50 ; linen, .60. 

83. Eliot's Silas Marner. Paper, .30 : linen, .40. 

S4. Dana's Two Years Before the Mast. Linen, .60. 

85. Hughes's Tom Brown's School Days. Paper, .45 i linen, .50. 

86. Scott's Ivanhoe. Pajier, .50 ; linen, .60. 

87. Defoe's Kobinson Crusoe, Linen, .60. 

88. Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin. Linen, .60. 

89. Swift's Gulliver's Voyage to Lilliput. Paper, .15. 

S«. Swift's Gulliver's Voyage to Brobdingnag. Paper, .15. Nos. 89, 90, one vol., 
linen, .40. 

91. Hawthorne's House of the Seven Gables. Paper, .50 ; K«en, .60. 

92. Burroughs's A Bunch of Herbs, etc. Paper, .15 

93. Shakespeare's As You Like It. Paper, .\o; linen, .2a. 

94. Milton's Paradise Lost. Books I-III. Paper, .15. Noa. 72, 94, one vol., linen, .40. 
95-98. Cooper's Last of the Mohicans. One vol., linen, .60. 

99. Tennyson's Coming of Arthur, etc. Paper, .15. 

100. Burke's Speech on Conciliation with the Colonies. Paper, .15 ; linen, .iS- 

101. Pope's Iliad. Books I VI, XXII, XXIV. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25 

102. Macaulay's Johnson and Goldsmith. Paper, .15 ; line?), .25. 

103. Macaulay's Essay on John Milton. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

104 Macaulay's Life and "Writings of Addison. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. Nob. 103, 
104, one vol., linen, .40. 

105. Carlyle's Essay on Burns. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

106. Shakespeare's Macbeth. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

107, 108. Grimms' Tales. In two parts, each, j:;aper, .15. Nos. 107, 108, one vol., linen, 40. 

109. Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. Paper, .30; toie«, .40. 

110. De Quincey's Flight of a Tartar Tribe. Paper, .15; linen, .25. 

111. Tennyson's Princess. Paper, .30. Also, in Jiolfe's Students' Series, to Teachers, 

' 112. Virgil's iEneid. Books I-TII. Translated by Cranch. Paper, .15. 

113. Poems from Emerson. Paper, .15. Nos. 113, 42, one vol., Zt«e«, .40. 

114. Peabody's Old Greek Folk Stories. Pajier, .15; hnen, .25. 

115. Browning's Pied Piper of Hamelin, etc Pape?-, .15 ; /«nen, -25 

116. Shakespeare's Hamlet. Paper, .15 ; hnen, .25. 

117, 118. Stories from the Arabian Nights. In two parts, each, paper, .15. Nos. W7, 
118, one vol., linen, .40. 

119. Poe's The Haven, The Fall of the House of Usher, etc. Paper, .15 ; hnen, .2fc. 

120. Poe's The Gold-Bug, etc. Paper, .15. Nos. 119, 120, one vol., linen, .40. 

121. Speech by Robert Young Hayne on Foote's Resolution. Paper. .15. 

122. Speech by Daniel Webster in Reply to Hayne. Paper, .15. Noa. 121, L22, one 

vol., linen, .40. 

123. Lowell's Democracy, etc. Paper, .15. 

124. Aldrich's The Cruise of the Dolphin, etc. Paper, 15. 

125. Dryden's Palamon and Arcite. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

126. Ruskin's King of the Golden River, etc. Paper, .15; hnen, .25. 

127. Keats's Ode on a Grecian Urn, etc. Paper, .15. 

128. Byron's Prisoner of Chillon, etc. Paper, .15 ; hnen, .25. 

129. Plato's Judgment of Socrates. Translated bj P. E. More. Paper, .15. 

130. Emerson's The Superlative, and Other Essays, etc. Paper, .15 

131. Emerson's Nature, and Compensation. Pai>er, .15. 

132. Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum, etc. Paper, .15 ; linen, 25, 

133. Sehurz's Abraham Lincoln, Paper, .15. Nos. 13.3, .32, one vol , Zinen, .40 

134. Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel. Paper, .30. Also, in Rol/e's Students' Series, to 

Teacherx, yiet, .53. 

135. Chaucer's Prologue. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

136. Chaucer's The Knight's Tale, and The Nun's Priest's Tale. Paper, .15 

Nos. 135, 1.36, one vol., hnen, .40. 

137. Bryant's Iliad. Books I, VI, XXII, and XXIV, Paper, .15. 

138. Hawthorne's The Custom House, and Main Street. Paper, .15. 

138. Ilowells's Doorstep Acquaintance, and Other Sketches. Paper, .15. 

140. Thackeray's Henry Esmond. Linen, ,75. 

141. Three Outdoor Papers, by Thomas Wentworth niGGiNSON. Paper, 15. 

142. Ruskin's Sesame and Lilies. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

143. Plutarch's Life of Alexander the Great. North's Translation. Paper, .15. 

144. Scudder's The Book of Legends. Paper, .15 ; hnen, .25. 

145. Hawthorne's ThelGentle Boy, etc. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

146. Longfellow's Giles Corey. Paper, ,15. 

147. Pope's Rape of the Lock, etc. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

148. Hawthorne's Marble Faun, Line7i, .60. 

149. Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, Paper, .15 ; linen, 2.5. 

W). Ouida's Dog of Flanders, and The Niirnberg Stove, Paper, 15; hnen, 2.5. 

151. Ewlng's Jackanapes, and The Brownies. P<i/>er, .15 ; linen, .25. 

I.i2. Martineau's The Peasant and the Prince. J'aper, .30 ; hnen, .40. 

1.W, Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream. Paper, .15; linen, ,'25 

154, Shakespeare's Tempest. Pajier, .15 ; linen, .25, 

15,5, Irving's Life of Goldsmith. Paper, .45; linen, .."iO. 

1.56, Tennyson's Gareth and Lynette, etc. Paper, 15 ; linen, .25. 

157 The Song of Roland. Translated by Isabel Butler, Paper, .30 ; hnen, id. 

158. Malory's Book of Merlin and Book of Sir Balin. Paper, .15 ; linen, 25. 

159. Beowulf. Translated by C. G. Chi LU. Paper, .15 ; hnen, .25. 

160. Spenser's Faerie Queene. Book I. Paper, .30 ; linen, .40 

161. Dickens's Tale of Two Cities. Paper, .45 ; linen, .50. 

162. Prose and Poetry of Cardinal Newman. Selections, Paper, .30 ; linen, 40. 
168. Shakespeare's Henry V. Paper, .15 ; hnen, .25. 

l%i. De Quincey's Joan of Are, and The EngliBh Mail-Coaoh. Paper, .15 ; Imen, ,26. 



mnmt atterature »iim»«2S, 

163. Seott'B Quentin Durward. Paper, .50 ; lin 

166. Carlyle'8 Heroea and Hero-Worsiiip. P< 

167. Norton's Memoir of Longfellow. Papei; 

168. Shelley's Poems. Selected. Paper, .45; lin 
Lowell's My Garden Acquaintance, etc. 
Lamb's Essays of Elia. Selected. Paper, 

171, 172. Emerson's Essays. Selected. In two 
one vol., Zinen, .40. 

173. Kate Douglas Wiggin's Flag-Raising. Paper, .15 ; linen, .'lb. 

174. Kate Douglas "Wiggin's Finding a Home. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

175. Bliss Perry 8 Memoir of Whittier Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

176. Burroughs'b Afoot and Afloat. Paper, .15; linen, .25. 

177. Bacon's Essays. Paper, .30; linen. 40. 
'"'"'■ " " "" "■ ■■ " hnen, .SO. 



170. ^Lamb's Essays of Elia. Selected. Paper, Q 018 RQ7 ilo« 




17.S. Selections from the Works of John Buskin. Paper, .45; 
^.179. King Arthur Stories from Malory. Paver, .30;; linen, .40. 
"ISO. Palmer's Odyssey. Abridged Edition. Linen, .75. 



181, 182. Goldsmith's The Good-Natured Man, and She Stoops to Conquer. 

paper, i 15; in one vol., linen, .40. 
183. Old English and Scottish Ballads. Paper, .30 ; linen, .40. 



paj)er,i 15; in one vol., linen, .40. 
d English and Scottish Ballads. I'ape 
184. Shakespeare's King Lear. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 



185. Moores's Abraham Lincoln. Paper, .15 ; hven, .25. 

186. Thoreau's Katahdin and Chesuncook. Paper, .15 ; linen, 25. 

187. Huxley's Autobiography, etc. Paper, 15 

188. Huxley's Essays. Selected. Paper, .15 Nob. 187. 188, one vol., hnen, .25 

189. Byron's Childe Harold, Oanto IV, etc Paper, .15 ; hnen, .25. 

190. Washington's Farewell Address, and Webster's Bunker Hill Oration Pa- 

per, .15 ; hnen, .25. 

191. Second Shepherd's Play, Everyman, etc. Paper, .30 ; hnen, .40. 

192. Mrs. Gaskell's Cranford. Paper, .30 ; linen, .40. 

193. Williams's iEneid. Liven, .75 

194. Irving's Byaeebridge Hall. Paper, .15 ; Hnen, 25. 

195. Thoreau's Walden. Paper, .io; linen, .50 

196. Sheridan's The Rivals. Paper, .Lr; linen, .25 

197. Parton's Captains of Industry. Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 

198, 199. Macaulay's Essays on Lorl Clive and Warren Hastings. In two parts, 
each, paper .15 ; in one vol., linen, .4(1 

200. Howells's 'The Rise of Silas Lapham Paper, .50 ; linen, 60. 

201. Harris's Little Mr. Thimblefinger Stories. Paper, .30 ; hnen, .40. 

202. Jewett's Tho Night Before Thanksgiving, A White Heron, and Sslected 

Stories Paper, .15 ; linen, .25. 
208. The Nibeliingenlied. Linen, 75. 

204. Sheffield's Old Testament Narrative. Cloth, .75. 

205. Powers' A Dickens Reader. Paper, .30 ; linen, .40. 

206. Goethe' i Faust. Part I. Linen, 75. 

207. Cooper s The Spy. Paper, .45 ; linen, .50. 

208. Aldrieh's Story of a Bad Boy. Linen, .50. 

209. Warner's Being a Boy. Linen, .40. 

210. Kate Douglas Wiggin's Polly Oliver's Problem Linen, .40 

211. Milton's Areopagitica, etc. Paper, .45 ; linen, .50. 

21'2. Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Paper, 15 ; linen, .26. 
213. Hemingway's Le Morte Arthur. {In Preparation.) 

EXTRA NUMBERS 

A American Authors and their Birthdays. Paper, 15. 

B Portraits and Biographical Sketches of 20 American Authors. Paper, ,15. 

D Scudder's Literature in School. Paper, 1,5. 

E Dialogue and Scenes from Harriet Beecher Stowe Paper, .15. 

F Longfellow Leaflets. Paper, .30 ; linen, .40. 

O Whittier Leaflets. Paper. .30 ; linen, 7iet, .40. 

ff Holmes Leaflets. Paper, .30 ; linen, .40. 

/ Thomas's How to Teach English Classics Paper, .15. 

J Holbrook's Northland Heroes. Linen, .35. 

K The Riverside Primer and Reader. Linen, 30. 

L The Riverside Song Book. Paper, .30 ; boards, .40. 

M Lowell's Fable for Critics. Paper, .15. 

JV Selections from the Writings of Eleven American Authors. Paper, .15. 

O Lowell Leaflets. Paper, .30 ; linen, .40. 

P Holbrook's Hiawatha Primer. Linen, .40. 

Q Selections from the Writings of Eleven English Authors Paper, 15. 

J? Hawthorne's Twiee-Told Tales. Selected. Paper, 20; hnen, 30. 

S Irving's Essays from Sketch'Book. Selected. Paper, 30 ; linen, .40. 

T Literature for the Study of Language. Pujier, .30 ; hnen, .40. 

U A Dramatization of The Song of Hiawatha. Paper, .15. 

V Holbrook's Book of Nature Myths. Li wn, .45. 
W Brown's In the Days of Giants. Linen, .50. 

X Poems for the Study of Language. Paper, .30 ; linen, .40. Also m three parta 
each, paper, .15. 

Y Warner's In the Wilderness. Paper, 20 : linen, .30. 
Z Nine Selected Poems. Paper, .15 ; hnen, 25. 

AA Coleridge's The Ancient Mariner and Lowell's The Vision of Sir Launfal. 

BB Poa'«'¥he Raven. Whittier's Snow-Bound, and Longfellow's The Court- 
ship of Miles Standish. Paper, 15. 

CC Selections for Study and Memorizing. For Grades I-III. Paper, .15 1 
linen, .ib. _ , , „ 

3>D Warrlner's T^d T—ohixm of Classics in tb« Orammar Grades. (In Frtpmrutum.^ 



